Adamantium
by sakurademonalchemist
Summary: Waking up on a train with no idea how he got there or why he was eleven again, Magneto finds himself thrown head first into the treacherous world of magic. Fortunately he's not alone, as familiar faces can be found even in Hogwarts, though apparently he wasn't the only one to suffer through puberty twice. Can he find a way back to his world...and will he want to when he does?
1. Chapter 1

**_Magneto will be slightly OC, as will Mystique. Mostly because they're now in a place where they're not automatically hated for being mutants. So far I have Magneto, Mystique and Sabertooth here, though he appears later._**

* * *

Magneto thought he had been through enough to have seen it all. From the evils of the Nazi camps to the intolerance of humanity...he had seen levels of human deprivation that it made him despair of ever seeing any good come out of it.

So when he was hit with something and woke up on an actual _steam_ powered train run by coal or some other fuel, in a body that looked disturbingly like his own when he was roughly eleven or twelve, in the company of other children eleven or twelve, he wondered what exactly had hit him this time.

He fully planned to sleep this off like a really bad hangover and hope the world fixed itself when he woke up. Otherwise he was going to demand some answers, and not in a friendly way.

So while he was on the weirdest drug-induced trip (or he hoped that was what was going on) he had ever been on in his life, he decided to find out where he was.

Apparently he was on a train to Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry (which made him wonder if Steven Strange had been here before) and he was a first year along with the two boys in his compartment.

Ron Weasley seemed extremely rude while Harry Potter displayed all the same signs he usually saw in mutants from abusive homes. Homes that didn't appreciate their gifts and did everything in their power to curb them.

Ignoring the brunette with the wild mane, he had to wonder exactly what the hell had hit him. At least he was able to ignore Ron by pretending to sleep, though the looks Harry shot him said clearly that he wasn't fooling the bespectacled boy.

About the only good thing out of this strangeness was the ever present connection to his mutation over metal.

Though as he confirmed it was still there (and it hadn't been active when he actually _was_ a prepubescent boy) was a new power he didn't recognize. It seemed to be wrapped around his mutation and when he mentally poked at it, he would swear it seemed to actually _purr_.

Now officially freaked out and really hoping this was some bizarre dream, the mutant called Magneto (who was using his birth name Erik Lenscherr since very few even knew it) hoped he only woke up before this got too ridiculous.

* * *

He didn't know what the appeal of the Victorian age was for these wizards, and he hoped to never find out. All he knew was that his power was limited because these idiots were more behind than anyone else.

What he did know rather irritated him.

He was now roughly eleven and a half by his guess, a 'wizard' (which meant that humanity had a whole _new_ reason to hate his existence, since the Church had never been reasonable at all about mutants), and for some bizarre reason he was in an alternate universe where his entire life story (or close enough) was amusement for the masses.

He was not pleased. At all.

He didn't know _why_ someone thought it amusing to write up a story of the X-Men or made him the villain, but if he ever met this Stan Lee he was going to have words with him. And he didn't think the man would enjoy meeting him.

Erik had been sorted into 'Slytherin' despite the fact he wasn't actually evil, just amoral when it came to humans. He would have ended up in Ravenclaw, but the hat had openly admitted he would likely eat the idiots alive or have them eating out of his hand within a week. He knew what real cunning and ambition _was_.

The thing was he couldn't get that kid Harry out of his head. Something about him made him think of his fellow mutants, and he noticed a lot of things a trained psychiatrist would have caught in a heartbeat within five minutes of meeting the boy.

So, in the spirit of gaining a potentially powerful ally that was actually _loyal_ to him, Erik slowly breached into Harry's little circle of friends. And by little, he meant subtly pushing Ronald Weasley out of his way.

Ron was a complete idiot, who was only every obsessed with three things at one time. Food, chess and Quidditch, and not necessarily in that order.

Harry seemed to be openly _thrilled_ to spend any amount of time far from Ron, as Erik tended to enjoy the older books that were in the deeper parts of the library, and Ron was a very lazy child who clearly hated reading even when he had to.

Harry, in the spirit of all children who had faced bullies, found refuge in the library.

* * *

"I don't get what this whole Slytherin versus Gryffindor debate is about. I mean, you don't seem evil," said Harry.

"It's a stereotype thing. Like how the Irish are all drunks or how all muggles are neanderthals," said Erik patiently. Harry was intelligent, if a bit skittish and not entirely comfortable with physical contact and very unfamiliar with genuine praise.

And as someone who had given sanctuary to countless abused teens (if Charles didn't get to them first) he knew the trick was to build up confidence slowly and to not put too much pressure on them. And if he found something the boy _was_ good at, then he had to encourage him to take it as far as he could.

So when he found out Harry was an extraordinary flier, he made a note to get a computer that worked with magic that came with a flight simulator. Having someone able to fly a helicopter or plane was useful, seeing as so few bothered with it.

"How come you don't believe that tripe?"

"I've been around long enough to realize it's pointless to hate someone for something as petty as race, religion, bloodline or 'House'," said Erik dryly.

Honestly, there were better reasons to hate someone. Though in the case of Charles and his merry band of idiots it was less that he hated them and more that they had a longstanding rivalry.

"So any idea how to write two feet on the properties of boomslang skin?"

Erik was about to answer him when he saw her.

Red hair the color of blood, sharp eyes that missed nothing and the gait of a cat stalking it's prey, and the way her companion kept shifting her hair color.

He'd recognize that face anywhere.

Realizing she was being watch, the girl turned and sneered him, obviously not recognizing his face. He made sure she saw his hand...and the three round metal balls that were slowly rotating on top of it, out of view of Harry, while he answered the boy's question.

Seeing her eyes widened perceptively, he had the metal spheres do a little dance, before smashing an ink well of a pure blood Slytherin who had irritated him earlier that week. He made sure the sphere was imbedded in one of the bookshelves so the trail of ink wouldn't lead back to him.

The girl stared at him for a moment, before she started to 'age' him mentally and recognition hit.

Apparently he wasn't the only one to wake up in this strange world...and it made him wonder if Charles was going to show up at some point.

She left the library, though it was clear she was going to confront him later just to confirm it really was him.

* * *

The first thing he said when he saw her again, alone and with no witnesses, was "Mystique."

"Magneto. So you're here as well. What family were you born into?"

"None. I woke up on the train with no recollection of how I got there or why I'm...eleven...again. Who was the girl?"

"My twin sister Nymphadora, though if you're stupid enough to call her by her first name to her face she's liable to hex you. If you really don't have any family, I can try to see if my...mother...will let you stay with us."

Mystique really wasn't used to having family that saw her gift for what it was...a blessing, not a curse to be hated. Then again, she was shocked that these 'magicals' had a similar gift that could be inherited.

Not to mention that her twins sister had the same gift.

Most of what she learned she got from Mystique, who's name here was Adhara, though she preferred her original name Raven, or her mutant name.

"So what name do you go by in this world?"

"Erik Lenscherr. As I said before, I woke up on the train with no memory of how or why I was there," said Erik.

Raven blinked.

"So...you went by your old name?"

He nodded.

"Well at least things won't be boring anymore."

"For you maybe. I'm forced to recreate the Brotherhood in Slytherin, which is full of incompetent, childish idiots."

Raven winced.

"Like Draco Malfoy?"

"You know him?"

"He's my cousin on my mother's side. So's Potter, through his paternal grandmother. There's a rampant issue of inbreeding in this place, and it's not uncommon for people to marry their second or third cousins. Thankfully my parents don't believe in most of that nonsense and the one time someone tried to draw up a marriage contract I nearly snapped the fool's neck," said Raven.

To be fair, the fact people would _want_ to marry her because of her gift hadn't occurred to her until then. Since then she made it very clear that _she_ would decide who she would marry and damn the consequences to how people felt about it. She was openly amused at how proud her mother was to that declaration and the fact she beat the snot out of the arrogant idiot without magic.

Ironically that only made her more popular with her aunt Narcissa, who loved her attitude and even taught her most of the dark magic she knew.

Even if, as a consequence she spent far too much time with her cousin Draco and that ass Lucius. Narcissa fully planned to make Raven the Black Heir, provided she could trick Sirius into it since he was made head of the House of Black. As it was, Raven was the only member of her family that was allowed to call herself a Black, despite not distancing herself from her 'traitor' mother or cousin.

"Interesting. Perhaps we can reconnect Harry to his father's family."

"How exactly did you get an in with the 'boy-who-lived' so quickly?"

She knew Magneto was charismatic to a point, but this was fast even for him.

"He is more in line with the children we take in from abusive families who hate them for their gift than the spoiled and pampered child everyone seems to believe he is. All he wanted was someone who acknowledges his fame but doesn't expect anything of him and won't pressure him unduly like that fool Weasley. Or remind him of the fact his parents were killed protecting him."

Raven hummed in her throat. That sounded like the Magneto she knew.

"Odds are my mother will take him in, and if possible you as well, unless you suddenly get a family as well. And before I forget, ask one of your house mates if they know anything about Occulmency. It's the art they've developed to deter mind readers like Dumbledore and Snape."

Erik grimaced at the idea of dealing with _more_ mind readers, but glad she had given him an idea of where to find a way to block it without his infamous helmet. He made a note to ask Draco if he knew anyone who taught the art.

The two went separate ways, but not before Raven started to draft a long, rather concise letter to her mother about absconding with Potter and possibly offering a place to stay for another.

When it came to battle plans, she tended to follow his lead because of the two of them only his powers were useful in combat. Spying was her forte, but she mostly relied on her martial arts skills in a fight.

It was good to have him back again. And have someone she could actually talk to without dealing with questions she didn't want to answer.

* * *

Harry was surprised when, a week later he was confronted by a pair of shapeshifters in a corridor and an amused Erik.

"What's this about?"

"How would you like to never go back to Surrey?" asked Erik.

Harry's nervousness disappeared in an instant.

"Who do you want hexed or pranked within an inch of their life?"

The red haired girl snorted in approval.

"Our mother is your second cousin, and she was surprised when I asked if we couldn't abduct you from the train station during the holidays rather than leave you in a house that clearly doesn't want you. Oh, and she agreed to let you stay with us until you graduate," she said to Erik.

Harry looked decidedly happier about the prospect of living far, far away from the Dursleys.

"Just in case, could you give us your mundane address? That way we'd have a general idea of where to go if we can't abduct you from the train station," said the other girl.

Harry wrote it down on a piece of parchment, and the bubblegum pink haired girl made sure to stick in someplace she wouldn't loose it.

For the most part school was boring, once you got over the fact it was magical.

Erik fully planned to see exactly _how_ intelligent Harry actually was by dragging him into muggle summer classes. He didn't need them, aside from a few history books, but Harry would if he wanted to survive. Raven already took classes, mostly as a cover and a way to kill time during the summers.

Now he just had to convince Snape to give him Occulmency lessons. With how much he dealt with mind readers, it would be nice to block the bastards out for once, even if he now knew whenever one was trying to sneak into his head within seconds.

He had already busted Dumbledore twice, but outside of demanding who it was (and noting the distinct wince) he had yet to call the old man out on it.


	2. Chapter 2

_**I would like to apologize in advance if this chapter upsets any of the readers. This chapter briefly delves into the less pleasant aspects of Magneto's past, specifically the part about him being in the camps where Hitler experimented on those who didn't fit his image of 'perfect Germans'. Also, I would like to point out that while I have no issues against German Shepherds, I understand they were fairly common in Germany and used frequently by the Nazis as guard dogs. Hence why Magneto isn't likely to own one anytime soon.**_

* * *

"Occulmency, the art of shielding the mind. You have all chosen to take an temporary course in learning how to defend yourself against," here Snape sneered at the term, "So called 'mind-readers'. Before we begin, I will warn you all. I will allow no slackers or childish tricks while I am teaching you. This is an entirely voluntary course and you are free to leave at any time...but if you do I will not teach you this twice. You have been warned."

Erik had dragged Harry and Neville with him to these private lessons, mostly because if he was going to build up their confidence then he wanted them to be prepared for anything. Besides, the more people shielded from nosy people like Charles, the happier he would be.

Charles was a good person, but he wasn't afraid to use his gift to get answers when he wasn't welcomed.

"In these lessons you will learn to shield your mind and detect foreign intrusions. Lenscherr! Let's see how well you do against a skilled legilmens, since you were the one who asked for these lessons," said Snape.

He hated children on a good day.

Lenscherr detected the intrusion alright, but throwing Snape out took several tries. He was mildly impressed, though he was more concerned with one of the memories he stumbled across.

Memories no child his age should have.

Much to his surprise, while the first years still flinched at his barking orders, they did listen. With the lack of house rivalry, they were actually more attentive than he was used to. It didn't hurt that the only Slytherin among them was Lenscherr, and he generally didn't give a damn about pure blood politics or the entire house rivalry system.

Which was why, after the others left for their common room, he waited before calling Lenscherr back into the room.

He had noticed the boy preferred long sleeved clothing, and if what he suspected was true, then he would have something no child his age should on one of his arms. If he was wrong, then it was a mistake he could live with and chalk up to too much information from a second-hand source.

"Lenscherr. While I was demonstrating Legilmency I noticed something that concern me greatly."

"I thought I sensed you brushing up against one of those memories."

"Who are you really? How did you end up in this school?"

"I gave my real name from the start. As to how I ended up here, I have no clue. All I remember is waking up on the train with no memory of how I got there," said Erik, neglecting to mention he had de-aged by several decades.

Snape, in his arrogance, only looked for the memories he expected to find...those from when he was actually a child. He never once went anywhere near the 'newer' memories and therefor had no idea Erik was anything more than a wizard who apparently got on the wrong end of a spell that somehow transported him to the future.

"Lenscherr, show me your arm," he said.

It didn't take a genius to figure out what he was looking for, so Erik showed him the crude tattoo with a series of numbers on it.

"I was picked out because of my gift, and my mother killed in order to try and bring it out."

Snape said nothing. What could you say upon learning one of your students was a victim of that horrific time and that he had been targeted because he had displayed magic in front of the blood purists. It certainly explained why he had no interest in the pure blood agenda and looked so disgusted with all of Malfoy's bragging about his Death Eater father.

"I will have to inform the headmaster about this, but rest assured we will try to see if any of your relatives have survived."

"I already secured a place to stay with the Tonks family."

He wasn't going to ask, as he had noted the interest Raven Black had in the rather withdrawn Slytherin.

* * *

"Are you absolutely sure of what you saw?" asked Dumbledore quietly.

"He has already mentioned he was Jewish when Draco called him on his pendant, and I saw the memories and the tattoo myself. He's a survivor of Grindlewald's camps, likely because he was a muggleborn."

It wasn't spoken of or mentioned, but Grindlewald hadn't exactly been that against Hitler's internment camps. He rarely if ever rescued any muggleborns caught in the purge of Germany, and they were tattooed like the muggles caught. While it was odd he had landed on the Hogwarts Express, or that his name was automatically added to the roster, they weren't going to ask many questions about what he remembered.

Though Dumbledore did take some solace that at least if Lenscherr did start gathering people like Tom did several years ago, he wouldn't be as cruel as him.

No survivor of _those_ camps would believe in the blood purity Tom Riddle had spouted, even after learning he was a muggleborn.

And there was no way he would send the poor boy back to his own time.

Aside from proving he had been in _those_ camps during one of the darker moments of Germany's history, there was very little fall out.

Erik could care less. After killing the same bastard who murdered his mother in front of him, he had put that part of his life behind him. And he was used to the uncomfortable looks on people's faces when they saw the tattoo, and the awkward silence that came from the realization of what he had been through.

The thing was, he had looked up his family name in one of the many places that were dedicated to reuniting families, and had come out of it with a box full of old things and the knowledge he was the last one left.

He idly wondered where that box went when he came here, then decided it didn't really matter.

In the mean time he had to help the others learn how to detect intrusions in the mind, since Neville wasn't very good at it.

* * *

"Halloween's coming up," said Erik.

Harry poked at his food, not really that enthusiastic about the holiday considering he found out that was when his parents were murdered.

"I know. Ron won't shut up about it," said Harry morosely.

"I don't know about you, but I'm not really interested in listening to the excited chatter of idiots and too much sugar. And I found out the location of the kitchens, so we could reasonably hide in there instead," said Erik.

Raven had discovered the kitchens, and promptly told Erik about it. So the decision to stay in there and avoid the headache inducing racket of the great hall was very appealing.

"...Can we bring Neville with us? His parents were put into St. Mungo's days after mine were killed," asked Harry.

"How about instead of celebrating a holiday for monsters, we celebrate those we've lost?" suggested Erik. Raven could get the alcohol, or the closest equivalent and they could quietly mourn those who were gone.

Harry nodded in agreement, because that appealed to him more than gorging on candy.

He took Neville aside and explained what they were planning to do, and when he found out Ron had chased Hermione into the girl's bathroom he informed Tonks who discreetly had her sit with the Hufflepuffs until the feast was over.

Raven, Erik, Neville and Harry...and a few others who lost someone during the war, went into one of the lesser known rooms on the seventh floor where they could sit next to a fireplace and enjoy a comfortable silence. The house elves left food on a large table, and they didn't leave until well after midnight, which was how they found out there had been a troll in the castle.

"Where were you?!" demanded McGonagall, looking more than slightly frazzled.

"Why?" asked Erik, not understanding what the big deal was.

"There was a troll in the castle. Why were you not with your assigned groups?"

"A _what_ in the castle?" said Raven, in open disbelief.

"Where were you when Quirrel came into the Great Hall alerting us to the troll that was in the dungeons?" demanded McGonagall.

"On the seventh floor, just ask the house elves," said Harry, confused and more than a little horrified that a monster had been loose in the castle.

"Let them breath. Why were you not in the great hall during the feast?" asked Snape, far more calm about the entire thing.

"Unlike some people we weren't really in the mood to 'celebrate' or gorge ourselves with candy. In case you've forgotten Harry _lost_ both of his parents today and he wasn't feeling up to dealing with Weasley's lack of tact, let alone his deplorable table manners. So a few of us opted to have a private celebration so we could mourn those that were taken from us," said Erik.

"Ms. Black, is this true?"

"When he asked me where they could be left alone to grieve and remember, I took them to that odd room on the seventh floor. The house elves brought us food and left us be, seeing as how we weren't up to anything. And to be fair we've already had to retrieve one of the Gryff firsties because of an insensitive comment made by Ron Weasley from one of the girl's bathrooms on the second floor," said Raven.

"Which one?" said McGonagall paling.

"The one close to the statue of Uric the Odd," said Raven.

She was bone white now...that was where they had cornered the bloody troll two hours ago! The idea that one of her lions was that close to being trapped in a bathroom with a fully grown mountain troll...

"Next time inform one of the teachers if you're planning to avoid the feasts," said Snape.

Or, he silently added, invite him so he wouldn't just be yet another lonely drunk trying to drink away the memory of Lily.

* * *

"Nervous about your first game?" asked Erik.

Harry nodded, his stomach full of ash.

"If it makes you feel any better, Raven can turn into animals."

"Really?"

Harry was absolutely amazed and impressed when Raven not only turned into his own Hedwig, but also a variety of different animals. Something that still baffled her parents, since her sister couldn't do it...or there was something that kept her from trying it.

Either way, it meant she would never have to register as an animagus, since every time they cast the spell to determine if someone was hiding as an animal it always came up negative.

"So even if something happened, Raven could catch you."

Raven rather liked the shy kid, even if he was likely going to end up as Magneto's protege. He was rather sweet, and she had the feeling he wouldn't care once he found out they were technically from another universe...or had the same powers and memories of people most believed were just comic book neutral-oriented villains.

That seemed to calm most of his nerves. The rest Erik took care of by reminding him that the audience was going to be more interested in the other's playing until he found the snitch, and by that time his attention was more likely to be on the ball than the people watching him.

With that cheery note, Harry was able to eat most of his breakfast before Ron finally got up.

It took Erik five seconds to locate the one jinxing Harry's broom, and less than two to spot the binoculars of the people next to the idiot staring far too intently at the boy trying desperately to stay on the broom.

One minute Quirrel was staring intently at Harry, the next the binoculars slammed into his head without warning. With his concentration broken, Harry was able to safely get back on his broom and catch the snitch.

"It was Snape! He was jinxing the broom!" said Hermione.

"No it wasn't. Snape might have a grudge against Harry's father, but he's not stupid enough to try and kill him so blatantly with countless witnesses. It was Quirrel," said Erik.

"Are you sure?"

"I just slammed his head with a pair of very heavy metal binoculars from the witch next to him, and almost immediately Harry's broom quit trying to throw him off. Besides, he was the last one to the great hall according to Snape _and_ McGonagall when the troll was in the area," said Erik flatly. And that wasn't even putting into account that his stutter was fake.

"...How did you hit him with a pair of binoculars from this far away?"

Erik held up his wand, though in reality he just used his powers over metal to do it. She didn't question it after that.

* * *

Hagrid was friendly, but there was no way Erik would be telling him anything sensitive or secret any time soon. He was a sieve of information and Erik found the fact he had kept that old article out suspicious. Even more so when he found out that Harry had seen the item (wrapped up) earlier that day.

On the plus side, he proved that he was a friendlier Slytherin than Hagrid was used to when he was nice to Fang. He honestly preferred animals to humans, because they weren't full of crap. They didn't care about bloodlines, or religion.

Though he would never own a German Shepherd. Not after having to deal with the guard dogs in the camps. Those things had been vicious and had turned him off any form of canine for the foreseeable future.

Which was why he fully planned to get a cat when he visited this 'Diagon Alley' instead. He could live with a cat.


	3. Chapter 3

**Have almost seventeen chapters written of this, and seriously considering a sequel where Harry goes to X-Men and screws everything up just so he can see the look on Magneto's face... I think I'll call it Mithril.**

* * *

"It's going to be Christmas soon," said Harry.

"I don't celebrate Christmas, and it's been years since I've bothered to celebrate Hanukkah."

"What's hankah?" asked Ron, who seemed resigned to having a Slytherin in Harry's proximity.

"Hanukkah is a Jewish holiday where we light a candles over a period of days and for each day we get presents. It also happens to fall roughly during the same period as Christmas, which is more of a Christian holiday," said Erik giving the barest description he could get, knowing that the full explanation was liable to go over Ron's head.

"I've heard that most records claim Jesus was Jewish, and that he was actually born sometime in the spring and not in the winter," said Hermione.

"Well they had to find _some_ way for people to celebrate the winter solstice, just like they stole the fall solstice and turned it into a commercialized headache," snarked Erik. Hermione snorted in agreement.

"Cor, I'd love to have several days of presents!" said Ron.

Erik rolled his eyes. Of course that would be all Ron thought about.

"So you haven't lit the menorah for a long time to properly celebrate the holiday?"

"What's a minnowra?" asked Ron.

"It's the thing they hold the candles on," said Harry. He wasn't Jewish but he did know what it was called.

"And it's called a men-oh-rah, not minnowra," said Hermione.

"Not since my mother was killed, no," said Erik.

"So are you planning to visit your relatives, Erik?" asked Hermione. She just assumed his father was still alive.

"Harry's relatives were...kind...enough to let me join him," said Erik with a straight face.

All true...just not in the way Hermione thought it was.

Actually they were going to be joining Raven and Tonks in visiting their home so Harry knew what Andromeda looked like.

And to make sure they knew exactly where Harry's aunt lived to get custody filed in all the appropriate places. No way was Erik letting Harry live in an abusive home.

Not when getting him out would cement him in the boy's good books and give him a powerful ally.

Though Raven seemed to think it was cute how protective he was over the kid. Almost like a little brother.

* * *

Raven, being old enough that the trace was no longer on her wand, cast disillusion charms on Harry. She walked Harry through how to use the Floo, before she had him hold onto her sister so he wouldn't get lost on his first try. Erik raised an eyebrow to Raven, who smirked.

"Your choice. Hold onto me or try your luck and hope you don't mispronounce it on accident."

"I will be pranking you for this," he said slightly amused.

Having a second childhood meant he had gained something akin to whimsy, and the fact he wasn't immediately hated because of his mutation (because no one knew about it just yet) meant he was actually more relaxed than he had been in years.

Raven preferred it, actually.

Erik was completely unprepared for her mother's reaction to him.

"SOOO CUTE!"

Raven, damn her, just started laughing her ass off.

"You neglected to mention that your mother was insane."

"Not insane, just a sucker for stray kids. If you're lucky I might spare you from the worst torment imaginable. And if you're really lucky then Molly Weasley won't learn Harry's moved in with us...that woman has the biggest set of lungs I've ever heard," said Raven smirking. Nymphadora was snickering at the shell-shocked look on Harry's face when he got similar treatment.

Erik mouthed the word 'mutation', and she shook her head. Though it would explain so much.

For the most part Christmas was more along the lines of getting to know the Tonks family a little better...or in the case of Erik being surprised with a menorah so he could properly celebrate Hanukah by Harry and Raven.

While he didn't get the whole 'multiple days of presents' deal (something he knew Ron _definitely_ would have complained about if it were him) it was nice being able to be a kid again. Even if he was technically the oldest person in the room.

* * *

"Remind me again why we're currently going 'shopping'?"

"Have you seen what Harry wears when he's not in class? The second mother saw what he had to wear she wanted to go postal on his 'aunt'. Also because I know you only have the clothes you found in your 'trunk', so you're stuck coming too. Besides, we have to go to one of the most annoying things in existence."

"Which is?"

"A pure blood party hosted by the Malfoy family. Because Harry, Nym and I are the closest relatives to Narcissa that she will acknowledge, it means we get an automatic invite. It also means you can expand your information network with the pure bloods and hopefully gain some useful allies, which I never bothered to do."

She didn't see the point of being nice to asshole pure bloods when they looked down on her for having a muggleborn father.

If he needed her to spy on someone, fine, but she had enough of playing nice in the viper's pit by holding her tongue...at least until the party was over and she could share scathing reviews of what the other women wore to her aunt Narcissa.

Which was ironically one of the reasons why she liked Raven better than her sister.

"You're enjoying this aren't you?"

"The powerful Magneto, reduced to being a pack mule and dress-up dummy? You better believe it!"

If only Charles could see this...he'd probably laugh as hard as she did.

Erik would have said something...if he didn't spot another face that looked a little too familiar.

Raven noticed where he was staring and looked. She frowned.

"Once was a coincidence, twice is a pattern," she muttered.

Andromeda spotted who was on the street, and went to move in front of her daughter and her daughter's "friend". Personally she thought the girl had a little too much interest in Erik for them to be _just_ friends.

She wasn't going to break out the marriage contract though.

Back to the one she had noticed on the street.

"Who is that?" asked Erik, feigning curiosity.

"Vincent Greyback... Fenrir Greyback's son," said Andromeda tightly. She had nothing against werewolves normally...but Greyback had a bad reputation of turning children and raising them as his personal minions. She knew one of his victims and the curse of being a werewolf was considered worse than being gay in the magical community.

To be fair, Vincent wasn't the product of a happy union, and the mother had disowned him the second he was out of her, with her family's blessing. Thankfully he went to Durmstrang.

Erik shared a look with Raven. Vincent looked more like a much younger Sabertooth to them. Easy way to check if it was him.

Raven knew what he had planned, and easily distracted her mother. Erik calmly went up close to the 'werewolf' and the closer he got, the more certain it was him. Spend enough years with someone and you tend to pick up on subtle queues.

Vincent narrowed his eyes at Erik, but merely glared at him. He was well aware of the stigmata of being a werewolf in England.

Erik calmly pulled his hand out of his pocket, and Vincent tensed...before recognition hit as he saw the spinning balls that weren't being held up by any spell. That plus the scent told him everything he needed to know.

"Magneto."

"Sabertooth. Mystique is currently over with the increasingly upset woman near the clothes store," said Erik calmly.

Sabertooth nodded, not giving any outward signs of how he felt upon seeing some of his old comrades.

"If this...You-know-who tries to make a second bid for power, or another idiot like him shows up, can I count on your support?"

"You planning to remake the Brotherhood?"

"If necessary. You know I really don't care about your blood status or if you're a werewolf or not, so long as they don't believe the same crap as the Death Eaters. I am a Slytherin after all."

Sabertooth grunted, not really caring. At least with Magneto he knew where he stood...and unlike Voldemort he knew Magneto wasn't of weak blood. He had been near the so-called "Dark Lord" once before he fell, and he seemed a little too spineless and weak for his taste. Not enough to even rate as a potential leader to him.

His "father" had been greatly displeased when he found that out.

At least he still had his mutation, even if he now turned into a deformed wolf-like creature once a month.

Erik moved away, letting Sabertooth do whatever it was he had been doing. At this rate he definitely going to keep an eye out for Charles, because this was the third time he had run across someone who was a younger version of the people he knew very well.

"Well?" asked Raven.

"It's him. If we need him, he'll back us up, but for now we'll leave him be," said Erik.

"...I'm beginning to see a pattern here," said Raven.

"You and me both. Keep an eye out for Charles once you graduate, will you? He's the only one who can give me a decent chess match."

"Have you considered Ron?" asked Harry, staying out of their conversation until now.

"Ron as in the human black hole?" asked Erik, surprised.

"He's beaten everyone in Gryffindor tower, and I'm tired of being the only one who's willing to try and go up against him in Wizard's Chess," said Harry.

"Huh. Ron might actually be worth spending time around... But I still refuse to sit next to him at meals," said Erik.

"Why do you think I'm glad Neville and I have a longstanding agreement not to mention houses during mealtimes?"

Harry was glad Erik let him sit next to him during meals, if he could pull it off. Hermione had taken to sitting next to Raven during mealtimes, because she found the older girl fascinating and an inspiration.

Raven was going to start Hermione on some martial arts so she could deliver a good right hook the next time Ron said a comment that made her cry again.

The only time it was considered dirty fighting was if you weren't the one doing it.

"You might want to be careful around Vincent Greyback. His father has a dangerous reputation and people might look down on you if you associate with werewolves," said Andromeda.

"They already look down on me for being a 'muggleborn'. And I could care less about the blood purity crap that Draco spews in the common room. Besides, people like Vincent can be useful."

"Just don't get bitten. There's a rather nasty stigma with werewolves, mostly because of his father and ignorance. Families have thrown even children out if they've been bitten, and I've heard tales of aurors losing their wives or husbands because of it."

Erik and Raven exchanged glances. That sounded far too much like how certain families reacted to having mutants in their bloodline. Just look at how Stryker treated his own son!

* * *

Narcissa Malfoy ne Black was many things, but an idiot wasn't one of them. She saw how her absolute favorite niece eyed the young boy who did an admirable job of keeping her son's rampant ego in check.

Frankly he could turn Draco into a newt for all she cared, provided the useless brat produced an heir for her to spoil first. And next time she wouldn't let the child spend so much time around her idiotic husband.

She could still remember the first time she met Raven (who, like her sister, rarely went by her first name, even if it was less embarrassing than being called Nymphadora), and the way the girl took Lucius out without once being rude or disrespectful to her elders.

Hard to believe her devious little raven was a Hufflepuff...but who would expect someone so twisted and cunning to hide in the house most thought as duffers?

 _Flashback, thirteen years ago..._

It was custom in pureblood society to introduce your children when they turned five. This was partly so you knew they would be able to survive _almost_ anything magic could throw at them, but also because by that time you would have seen _some_ sign of accidental magic.

And from what little her estranged sister said, these two had more than enough magical potential to make them very desirable as wives.

Metamorphamagi were rare, and it was slightly disappointing her son had yet to display such a rare and valuable gift.

Seeing little Adhara view everything from behind a rather sharp, almost hawk-like gaze, she immediately commanded Narcissa's attention. Nymphadora was clumsy, but bright eyed and adorable.

So Narcissa watched, and learned.

Little Adhara was definitely intelligent and perceptive. And the vindictive tone when she shot back a rather witty retort to a foolish comment made by Lucius... She was definitely Slytherin or Ravenclaw worthy.

As the years went on, Raven displayed more and more Slytherin-worthy traits...and that was before she showed her affinity towards spycraft. The girl could slip into any conversation, and then slip out before anyone realized that she was gone. It was impressive enough that in her third year...and hadn't that shocked them, when she got chosen as a Hufflepuff, but then again no one would suspect one of the Puffs to be a snake in disguise, and they were always considered friendly...that Narcissa introduced the girl to the dying Orion Black. His wife, having died three years earlier.

Orion was not only charmed by little "Raven", since neither her sister or Adhara used their real names except for legal documents, but what was left of Walburga openly approved of the girl.

Especially since the only reason Raven went into Hufflepuff was to protect and defend her twin's honor. Nymphadora was a good girl, but she was clumsy and a bit naïve. Raven was devious, and above all a Slytherin at heart. She had that spark that most of the Slytherins that graduated after Voldemort's fall lacked.

Orion was so impressed with her, that he decided to name her the Heir of the House of Black in the event Sirius did not produce an heir and allowed Andromeda and her family to rejoin their family ranks.

The odds of Sirius producing an heir while locked away in Azkaban were next to zero. So it was generally a given that Raven would be the next head of the House of Black.

When Orion died of natural causes in Raven's fifth year, she was given the title as Heir of the Black family, with Sirius as the head only by technicality and because it was too late to change the paperwork.

Needless to say Lucius was disappointed, but at least it wasn't Nymphadora, who refused to learn any dark magic except under protest. Raven not only dove into those lessons, she displayed a vindictiveness that often made Narcissa wonder if she had been born to the wrong mother.

Either way Raven was her favorite niece...even if she openly told Narcissa if she ever ran into Bellatrix outside Azkaban she would kill her.

Blood or not, Raven wasn't going to let a mad dog ruin their family name.

Which, ironically considering a thirteen year old was casually talking about ending her aunt in cold blood and possibly with a variety of barely legal magic considering it was kept in-house so to speak, only made Narcissa like her more.

Either way Narcissa knew to watch Raven if that idiot Voldemort ever came back. She was too vindictive and devious (not to mention intelligent) to ever follow Dumbledore...and she didn't see someone with half the wit Raven had following a Dark Lord who had a bad habit of taking out his frustration on his followers with a nasty torture curse that could drive one insane.

So whoever Raven followed might be more worthy of another daughter of the Black family.

 _Flashback end..._

Narcissa was looking forward to this years Christmas party. She had heard rumors that Raven was showing an inordinate amount of interest (for her) in a boy. One who thankfully was in Slytherin... and if Snape was telling the truth was the victim of a rather unusual spell Dumbledore was in no mood to reverse, even if it meant he wasn't in his own time.

He wouldn't say more than that, but it did leave a lot of guess room for why.


	4. Chapter 4

**Okay, a quick list of all mutants (and one non-mutant but still an Avenger) I have already added to the story...but will make an appearance later.**

 **Magneto**

 **Mystique**

 **Sabertooth**

 **Rogue**

 **Nightcrawler**

 **Wolverine (he acts mostly as a plot McGuffin until later)**

 **Steve Rogers/Captain America**

 **Jean  
**

 **Unawakened Hank McCoy**

* * *

If it weren't for the fact he wasn't a child, Erik would have been bored out of his mind. Raven, damn her, was having far too much amusement at their expense.

At least he wasn't alone. Neville, Harry and a few others he recognized (like Blaise Zabini, his roommate) were with him.

He also had the foresight to bring a book to read.

Neville and Harry stuck close to him. One because he wasn't used to crowds and hated the looks the adults were giving him (Harry), and the other for a conversation that wouldn't leave him feeling unhappy at the end of the night (Neville).

For the most part they used Erik as a shield from the others, while Harry and Neville discussed how to mix muggle methods with magical plants, with Erik occasionally contributing.

Eventually Blaise managed to come and mingle.

"Lenscherr."

"Zabini."

"How did the inheritance test you took go?"

It was little secret Erik had gone into Gringotts to see if he had any vaults, considering _how_ he landed in this place. Raven and 'Vincent' lucked out...they were born to already magical families and either regained their memories early or had them slowly added (Vincent's came back more or less after his father insured he would end up a werewolf, part of the reason why he hated him).

He had mostly been de-aged and dumped on a moving train.

"It turns out I'm a half-blood from a long line. Though I had them move the main vaults to England since I'm not a fan of Germany," said Erik neutrally.

Blaise hummed in his throat. If Erik was a half-blood, then he wouldn't be harassed nearly as much. And from the way Snape had actually _deducted_ points from his own house if he caught them harassing Lenscherr about 'not being wanted by his own family' it was obvious his entry into Hogwarts had some rather unpleasant meaning.

Either way no one could get anything out of Lenscherr.

Blaise stuck around, making idle chit chat, but it was obvious Black had dragged him and Harry here. He just wished he had half the foresight Lenscherr had and brought a book himself. Or maybe not.

At least he didn't look half as bored as the other children trying to act like adults.

By the end of the party, Erik had impressed more than one adult with the casual way he displayed his control over 'magic' by constantly spinning the Chinese meditation balls Harry had gotten him for Christmas. To be honest he was surprised Harry had noticed his habit of using the smaller variants to keep his temper calm or to relax. The light sound they made while rotating against each other was something he always found soothing.

( _A/N_ : _if you want an idea of what they look like, they're metal spheres about the same size as a peach, and they make this light metallic chime-like sound when you have them spinning against each other in your hand or just bump them against each other and often come in decorative boxes. No idea what's inside them. And they sound like something Magneto would keep around to chill out...much like he did with the five round marble-sized spheres he had banging against each other when Sabertooth told him that he had failed his mission in the first movie._ )

Harry had given him two of sets of them, but he had only brought along one.

Needless to say the fact he had done so amused Raven immensely, as had the fact he brought a book about metallurgy.

Narcissa casually sidled up to her favorite niece.

"That boy reading the book is the one you're interested in, isn't he? The one Draco had been complaining about for the past few weeks."

Raven displayed no outward signs of interest, but then again she had been schooled personally by Narcissa since she was eight and she realized Draco was a lost cause. He was entirely too much like his father...or he had an unhealthy amount of hero worship for an idiot.

"If You-Know-Who does come back, Erik will eat him alive and then spit him out. He could care less about pure blood politics and he's not as weak minded as Dumbledore."

Narcissa smirked, but schooled her expression with years of practice.

"What about Potter?"

"He might be salvageable, but I believe he'll follow Lenscherr's lead in a crisis. He has shown none of the same disgust Weasley has displayed around Slytherins. However I expect Dumbledore will try to keep us from protecting him from his...less pleasant...relatives," said Raven discreetly. She preferred the word 'mundane' to muggle, as the other words seemed rather derogatory.

Narcissa eyed the rather skinny Potter, and nodded in agreement. If they kept Dumbledore from trying to strong arm the boy into living with his relatives (who apparently didn't know how to care for a child, if his scrawny frame and the way he shied away from the crowd was any indication) then it would mean he would view his distant cousins more favorably.

The fact it would likely piss off that senile goat was just bonus.

"I take it Andromeda is planning to take him in?"

"She's already extended an invitation to him and Lenscherr."

While it was a pity they couldn't house the boy in the Malfoy Manor (partly because she didn't want the headache of Dumbledore coming _near_ her home if she could help it, and he would to insure Lucius wasn't corrupting the boy if she knew him), at least he would be in neutral territory and with an acceptable family.

Lucius would likely agree because it meant getting the boy away from his muggle relatives... and later she would question even _that_ claim to his blood, seeing as how Petunia looked nothing like her sister and she looked nothing like either of her parents.

* * *

"So let me get this straight. You believe Professor Snape is after some stone made by Nicholas Flamel, a man who is a noted alchemist in both mundane and magical society?"

Hermione stared at him.

"How do you know Nicholas Flamel?" she said dumbfounded.

Erik gave her a look.

"I happen to be fascinated with metallurgy, and my magic seems to respond better to metals than wood," he said dryly.

"Is that why you're so fascinated with that Magneto character from _X-Men_?" asked Harry innocently.

"That and I like him better than Professor X. Besides we share the same birthday," lied Erik.

He didn't _like_ Magneto, he _was_ Magneto. Not that he was about to explain that.

"Well I for one find it in extremely poor taste that you decided to tattoo your arm," said Hermione with a sniff. She had caught a few glimpses of it, and assumed he wore long sleeves to hide it from the teachers.

Erik froze.

"What tattoo?"

"The one on your left arm with a series of numbers."

Erik closed his book and got up.

"Granger, if you ever want to be in my presence again do yourself a favor and drop that particular subject," he said rather coldly. He was _not_ about to let some buck-tooth know it all chastise him for something he would very much prefer to forget.

Hermione looked like he had physically slapped her across the face, and none of the others were looking too sympathetic. Particularly Harry, as he had been given the same cover story Erik had come up with during Christmas. At least, the one he told the Tonks family.

If Erik didn't bring the subject up, then Harry would just ignore the tattoo...and the memories it brought up.

Raven looked slightly irritated at Hermione.

"Granger, next time try not to act like Ron Weasley," Raven said a little annoyed.

She looked like she had been slapped again, this time from an older student she respected.

Ronald Weasley was well known for having almost no tact and even worse manners...especially table manners. Commenting on the tattoo was something she would have expected from the red-haired blunder.

Seeing she didn't understand, Harry decided to elaborate.

"Hermione, you know Erik is Jewish, right?"

"Yes, but..."

"I know you're smarter than this Hermione. Does Erik seem like a rebellious teenager or one who would agree with Hitler's stupidity?" asked Raven, catching on to what Harry had in mind.

"No. He openly shows his dislike whenever You-Know-Who's ideology is talked about and he doesn't believe in the pure blood agenda, even if he is a Slytherin."

"So at what point did you actually thing someone like Erik would think it _amusing_ to tattoo his arm the same way the Nazi did to those they captured and put into interment camps?" said Harry.

Seeing her wince, he knew she got the message.

"Should I go apologize?"

"I'd let him cool off first. After that amount of sheer stupidity I don't think he'd want to be around you. I'd give him a week, or let him approach you first unless you want to be hexed," said Raven.

As the one who knew him best, she knew even that wasn't very likely. Granger would be lucky if he spoke to her for a month.

* * *

Harry found Erik blasting things with those meditation balls he gave him for Christmas on the 7th floor.

"I can't say I blame you for destroying things, and I'm not going to tell you to forgive her right away. That was way out of line, even for her."

"She's one of those people who always assumes she's right and refuses to believe the opinion of others, unless they outrank her. A sycophant who believes she's a rebel," said Erik in disgust.

She was the type of person who would react badly to learning about the existence of house elves, and the fact that they were, by a muggle's standpoint, enslaved.

In truth they were a subspecies of brownies, and had at some point suffered from a wasting disease making it very difficult to draw on the natural magical energy in the earth. So in a bid of desperation they latched onto the first compatible source they could find...wizards.

By the time the disease was gone, having been bred out, the brownies had lost contact with their original nature and house elves were created.

And by the time that happened, the wizards figured out that the elves had forgotten what they were so they set up a system and eventually even forgot that.

Leading to an entire species of creatures who didn't care about being used as servants, provided you treated them well.

Lucius had been happy to get rid of Dobby once Erik had seen the condition he was in, and even Raven had Kreacher, though she only tolerated him so long as he didn't get on her nerves.

"I'm not really in the mood to talk," said Erik.

"How about a game of Wizard's Chess?" suggested Harry.

A set appeared as well as some chairs. Erik decided to take a break from his spell practice and took the side with the black pieces. Harry sat down on the white side, and Dobby showed up with some refreshments.

After two games, his temper had started to cool. After five, he started to think rationally again.

"You're really not very good at this are you?"

"Never played before I came to Hogwarts," said Harry.

"I'll get you a book," said Erik.

When they finally left the room, his anger had calmed to a glacier cold fury. Years of experience had taught him to temper his anger, to focus it to a pinpoint, so that he could use it to fuel his mutation...or more recently his magic. Besides, she was only a child and there were easier ways than attempted murder.

* * *

"I heard the mudblood really put her foot into it today," said Malfoy with a sneer.

"And I heard that your dorm room is right next to mine and therefor easily breached for some rather nasty pranks, seeing as how I have yet to gain the trust of any of the Gryffindor females to target Granger directly," said Erik without looking up from his book.

"Lenscherr five, Malfoy zero," said Nott snickering.

Draco growled at having his ego being attacked indirectly, yet again. The thing was that Lenscherr wasn't even going at him directly, and opening himself for a legal wizard's duel. He did it like he was commenting on the weather, which really annoyed him.

The worst part, in his mind, was the fact that Erik Lenscherr was the unofficial leader of Slytherin for the way he kept Draco in check and he wasn't even a proper pure blood, but according to goblin records a very respectable half blood from Germany. Though that did beg the question as to why he wasn't attending Durmstrang instead.

The fact Snape liked him enough to put up with Potter was the other reason.

"One of these days Lenscherr..." growled Draco.

"You'll actually grow a spine and not hide behind your daddy's skirts?" said Erik, turning a page.

Draco whipped his head around when he heard someone snicker, but he couldn't identify who it was.

Draco stomped away in childish rage, and Erik snorted. Hopefully the idiot would mature at some point. Until then Erik would run circles around him with glee.

Nott snorted in amusement, before clapping Erik on the shoulder.

"Well played. Nice to see the Malfoy family reminded that there's a pecking order and he's not immune to being taken down a few dozen pegs for once," said Nott.

"It also doesn't help that his mother told me to keep chipping away at his ego until he learns his father isn't the all powerful center of the universe like he seems to believe...or that Lucius Malfoy told me he'd pay me fifty galleons if I got his son to quit sending him so many owls whining about minor infractions," said Erik.

Blaise let out a whoop of laughter. So even the great Lucius Malfoy was tired of hearing Draco whine to him about every little thing.

If the war restarted or a new Dark Lord showed up, odds were most of the younger Slytherins would back Lenscherr. At least he seemed reasonable and not a Dumbledore fan. And he wasn't the type to curse first and listen second.

Not if half the talk about Voldemort was true.

"So how are you going to retaliate against Granger?" asked Blaise.

"I'll let her stew for a week and if she doesn't seem apologetic or willing to change her attitude I'm going to ice her out completely. I don't need some know-it-all bossy brat getting on my nerves and ruining things just because they 'offend' her. I bet you anything if she finds out about house elves she try to do something stupid like 'free' them from their 'enslavement' without bothering to find out how the entire system came to be," said Erik rolling his eyes.

"What's that mean?" said Tracey.

"Houses elves were originally brownie spirits that were suffering some magical deficiency illness and turned to wizards in order to survive. By the time the disease bred out, the elves couldn't remember a time before they weren't dependent on wizards, and after a while the wizards themselves forgot about the whole thing. So now you have an entire species who serve wizards without remembering why or how things used to be."

"Huh. Never knew there was a reason for house elves."

"History can be fascinating...when it's not taught by some dead old idiot who makes goblin wars as interesting as watching paint dry," said Erik.

"...Got any books?" asked Blaise.

Erik reached into his bag and handed him one. This was one about the history of World War two...the muggle side anyway.

"Just so you know, that book doesn't have moving pictures and is full of more or less accurate information but will not mention Grindlewald or Dumbledore in any way shape or form."

"...Is this a muggle history book?" asked Blaise slowly.

"Yes, but it doesn't glorify Dumbledore or his efforts in the last war against a Dark Lord and they actually bothered to check their facts. Not to mention the people that wrote it know how to spell and use actual grammar you can understand."

Blaise thought that one over. On one hand it was muggle. On the other hand, no mentions of Dumbledore or how great he was.

If nothing else he could use it to put him to sleep.


	5. Chapter 5

"For the record, I blame you," said Blaise, right before he let out a massive yawn.

Erik smirked.

"Coincidentally I may have loaned out that book to a few others," said Blaise.

His smirk widened and turned into an evil grin.

"And now we hate you for giving us nightmares."

"Ask Snape for pointers on how to make the first year Hufflepuffs cry, or better yet the Ravenclaws," said Erik.

"...And suddenly I don't hate you nearly as much. It's a miracle," said Blaise.

"Coincidentally I have others until the last big event to make international news," he informed him.

"Are they like the first?"

"Less graphic but still full of accurate information about the reality of muggles, and that they aren't as stupid as Malfoy claims."

"So muggle studies..."

"Absolute waste of time and energy, not to mention money. If you want to learn more I'll introduce you to reality," said Erik.

"Sold."

Who knew the way to break the news to the pure bloods that muggles were _way_ ahead of them in science and technology was to leave a few history books around?

* * *

Hermione approached him two weeks after the incident.

"Are you going to quit jumping into conclusions and actually look into why things are?"

She seemed to be mentally counting to ten.

"I realize I may have been rather rude and impolite, and I shouldn't have acted like Ronald Weasley," she said.

"That's not what I asked. I asked if you've learned not to jump to conclusions without the facts behind it. And I suppose I've gotten my answer. Until you've learned to do your research before you say something as offensive as what you said last month, don't try to act like I've forgiven you," said Erik coolly.

Hermione winced, and realized she might have gone too far.

"Raven will still teach you to fight, but until you've learned to lose the chip on your shoulder, we are not friends or even acquaintances."

Okay, now she knew she had gone too far...and this was before she found out about how he ended up in Hogwarts.

"Well?"

"I dropped her like a dungbomb about to go off. If she wants to come anywhere in my sphere of acquaintances, she'll have to lose the know-it-all attitude and the chip in her shoulder," stated Erik flatly.

"Good. You know you earned a lot of points in the tower for that, right?"

"And I care why?"

"I know you normally don't, but the fact is that if You-Know-Who isn't really dead or another Dark Lord shows up with similar views, then it's better to have your house behind you, especially if it's the one everyone hates. The more they approve of you, the less enemies who aren't afraid to get dirty are against you."

"..."

It was ironic. He spent most of his life after meeting Charles and killing the man who gave him the most nightmares collecting mutants under a similar view, and now he was doing something similar, only people were willing to join him simply because _he_ was the best option and could care less.

"Why do I get the feeling Raven will be laughing at me again for this?"

"Why did you think she wouldn't? She's a girl and they're all insane."

"True, but only a fool would say as much to their face, and only a dead man would do so during the time of month when they become even more dangerous than a werewolf."

Blaise let out a laugh in agreement.

It was weird not having to worry about which side you were on when a new player entered the arena. With Lenscherr in control of Slytherin and Snape backing him subtly, there was little chance any of those currently in school would back anyone _but_ him if another war started up.

Erik Lenscherr was a cold, calculating bastard...but at least he was better than the alternatives.

* * *

Quirrel, as it turned out, had the luck to run into Harry and Erik coming back from the library during a late night raid of the shelves for new spells to try or research.

Bad luck, that is.

The man forced Harry and by extension Erik to go through a series of rather boring (to Erik anyway) tests that lead up to a mirror.

Quirrel was more interested in Harry for some reason...and Erik was more interested in the mirror. He was at an angle that he could see his reflection and he wondered what was so special about the blasted thing other than being exceptionally gaudy. He could tell it was real gold, but that was about it.

He saw himself wink, before placing something in his back pocket.

"You! You have the stone don't you? Give it to me Potter, and I'll make your death quick!" spat Quirrel. He had sensed the magic in the mirror, but had no idea it wasn't Harry who activated it.

Harry looked at Erik helplessly, and he was honestly sick and tired of this nonsense. He just wanted some sleep!

That was when Quirrel revealed something they weren't expecting.

There was a second face on his head.

"Right, I've had enough of this nonsense," said Erik, speaking for the first time since this began. He drew his wand, mostly for show since he didn't want Dumbledore learning he could control metal directly without magic, and pulled on the mirror.

Quirrel didn't know what hit him. One minute the second head was speaking, the next the mirror slammed into him hard enough to at the very least give him a concussion. With how heavy that thing was (and Erik had gotten very good at judging weight with his mutation over the years as necessity) it was too heavy for the average wizard to push off enough to get out from under it. Especially if they hit their head in the process.

The spirit, or whatever the hell it was, was cursing at both boys without much restraint.

Which was why Erik tossed Harry a pair of ear plugs.

"Do I want to know?"

"Do the words plausible deniability tell you anything?"

"Right. Just tap me on the shoulder when you're done," said Harry, firmly turning away when he noticed the gun floating behind Erik.

He didn't need to know where Erik got it, though Raven had been missing a few hours while they were at the Tonk's residence and had come back with a few packages she gave to Erik.

He was still amazed she had a pilot's license and an actual helicopter. Though considering her personality he highly suspected she just stole the helicopter and bought the guns from a disreputable source.

It took a few minutes, but Erik tapped Harry's shoulder. He very firmly did not turn back to look. He knew better.

Harry took out his ear plugs, and stuck them in his pocket.

"Now, to get us out of here. Dobby!"

"What can Dobbys do for you sir?" he asked. Erik was easily a better master than his last.

"Drop the two of us a corridor away from the Medical Wing. No telling if that idiot hit us with something without his wand. Then I want you to deliver this to Raven with the instruction she is not to let anyone know she has it until we find out what it is," instructed Erik.

Dobby nodded and took them out of the room and away from the body.

Erik had already recovered the metal fragments of the bullet, and there were no other signs of how he killed Quirrel.

Harry, aside from being a little shaken up, was fine and so was Erik, but they were still drinking a calming draught.

Needless to say he was just glad the fool was dealt with and they wouldn't have another pointless day of his fake stuttering. A dead enemy was one that wouldn't come back to try and kill you after all.

* * *

"Remind me to shove a calming draught down her throat during the big exams," groaned Harry.

Hermione was a _nightmare_. The only reason they hung out with her was out of pity and the fact they were the only ones brave enough to do so.

"Agreed," said Neville. He was starting to think Erik had the right idea about dropping her. Hermione was smart...book smart anyway...but her personality needed a lot of work before she could be tolerable to be around.

"So what now?"

"Now? Now we rob the other houses blind while playing innocent about why they don't have any money. Ever hear of poker?" said Harry with an evil grin.

Raven had been kind enough to give him the cards when he told her what he wanted them for...and a list of suckers she had beaten because of her excellent control.

Besides, the only time she didn't cheat a bunch of hormonal idiots out of their gold was when she had her sister do it for her. Half the time the boys were too busy staring at Nymph's chest than they were their own cards...and the other girls were too busy taking advantage of the boy's stupidity.

At least she didn't have to teach Harry how to be a card shark.

He had already beaten Draco out of all the money he had brought to Hogwarts.

* * *

"Well?"

"Neville was the perfect fall guy. He would pretend to call my bluff and the idiots didn't even realize they'd been had until after I showed my cards," smirked Harry.

"Good. If we do this right then we might even be able to join Raven in cleaning out the goblins," said Erik.

Harry's grin was feral and not the least bit comforting. For too long he had been told, repeatedly, that he was useless, a waste of space and money.

It was nice to be on the other side for once...and with someone that knew what they were doing.

"Now onto other matters. You wanted to learn how to use a gun?"

"Wands are good and all, but most pure bloods wouldn't know what a gun was until it was too late to heal the damage."

Erik sighed. While this was a good first step in the right direction, it was too early for him to learn fire arms.

"Would you consent to learning how to use a knife first? And I don't mean the honorable way, I mean the dirty stuff."

"Raven?"

Erik nodded.

"I suppose. Easier to explain why you're carrying a knife than it is a gun."

"Easier to maintain and to make as well. Guns require bullets, and bullets cost money. Any idiot can make a knife with a little patience and nine times out of ten people respond more quickly to a knife than a gun."

Not to mention it was easier to heal a cut than it was to heal a bullet wound.

"In the meantime we'll work out what to do next year and learn everything we can from Narcissa and Andromeda."

Harry nodded, his eyes hard. This wasn't the innocent golden Gryffindor everyone believed he was...this was the child that spent ten long years abused every single day given a chance to be the one to deal out the damage.

Vernon and Petunia had done everything save rape, and that was because they couldn't stand to touch him for long periods of time. They left most of the physical abuse to their son.

He would not miss them or cry at their funerals.

* * *

Vincent was bored, and there was no way he'd listen to his father's suggestion considering the full moon was coming up.

Fenrir was an ass.

So he decided to pay his boss a visit instead. At least Magneto would give him something to do that wasn't beyond tedious and he got away from the idiot as well.

It took him three days to find him, and he ignored the way the pure blood twit and her first-gen husband shot him wary looks through the window. He was used to worse.

"Do you know where the werewolf packs meet?" asked Magneto, and idea forming.

"Most of the ones in Europe. They generally avoid the pack I'm in for being too feral."

"Would they be interested in a third side with no interest in being part of either Dumbledore's idiots or Voldemort's fools?"

"Treat them like you would our own and they'll respect you."

Magneto was a good pack leader. He at least listened to his minions and actually got down and dirty when time called for it.

He also wasn't insane or a hypocrite like Dumbledore or Voldemort were.

"Here's what I want you to do. Get into contact with the other packs and tell them that there's a strong possibility this...Voldemort...survived and might try to make a comeback. When he does, then they are welcome to join our side and say to hell with the other two."

Vincent nodded.

"Any idea what we'll call it?"

"Stick to the old name. We'll just substitute mutants with magic," said Magneto. Vincent could care less what they called it, but others might. "We're not discriminate on race, blood line or gender, but we're also not going to accept those who would only be a hindrance later, like Dumbledore's idiots."

Vincent grunted.

"I'll spread the word. Don't expect much though, because most only see that idiot who's my father in this world."

"I'd rather pick up allies now than have a mad scramble later dealing with incompetent competition like the headmaster," deadpanned Erik.

Vincent smirked.

"At least Logan isn't here to get on my nerves anymore," said Vincent.


	6. Chapter 6

Their summer was mostly spent either learning magic, doing homework, or in Harry's case learning the controls of the helicopter Raven confirmed she had stolen literally from under the Royal Air Force. Though according to her it was taken more out of boredom than anything else.

Ironically it was Ted, Andromeda's husband who provided the lessons on knife fighting...and dirty knife fighting. Apparently he had been in the army for some years after graduating Hogwarts, only to be discharged because of a badly broken leg.

He had the bones removed and regrown, but he never listed himself as magical so he didn't have to go back. Besides, he was three days shy of his last assignment when it happened. So they kept his name on reserve, and more or less forgot about him.

Though it amused Raven endlessly that her father paid Erik fifteen galleons to give Harry the Talk, once the 'boy' proved he knew more than enough that he wouldn't need it twice.

Magneto had been over sixty. He didn't need to deal with the stumbling, embarrassed conversation about how babies were made _twice_.

* * *

"I don't know whether to laugh or mock you," said Raven.

Erik had given Harry a blunt, but no less embarrassing, talk about how babies were made. With help from a couple of breeding dogs and an explanation that humans generally had more room to maneuver. Harry had been mortified, but at least it had come from someone his own age and not someone like Raven or Andromeda.

Even if it took him a week to be able look Raven and Nymph in the eyes again, to their amusement.

"So, any idea what this year is going to be like?" asked Harry.

"Mostly a chance to review if you've remembered the basics. Next year you get to pick your electives, but whatever you do don't pick Muggle Studies or Divination. One is completely outdated and the other is taught by a woman who relies far too much on the use of recreational plants and sherry," said Raven.

"Ugh, don't remind me. I kept sneezing so much I had to get the homework from the others...and after two months I dropped the course entirely!" said Nymph.

"Care of Magical Creatures is fun, but Arithimancy is rather boring unless you like math. Though it was hilarious to see the expression on Professor Vector's face when I brought in an Advanced Calculus book. She couldn't understand half the signs and words in there," said Raven.

She was proud to say she graduated with honors at the 'muggle' high school she picked. She was currently planning to head to either mundane or magical college, if only to keep up her method of making contacts in both worlds, despite how her aunt felt about it.

"Speaking of magical creatures... Erik and I have some unfinished business we need to take care of. We won't be gone long."

Nymph, being as mischievous as her namesake, couldn't resist shouting after her twin "Don't forget to wear protection!"

Seeing Raven stumble made it totally worth embarrassing her sister.

"We're not like that!" said Raven, who couldn't help the blush.

"Not yet," said Harry, joining Nymph's side of the teasing.

Seeing the two of them with a monumental blush, the others cracked up.

"I really hate having unbalanced hormones," said Erik.

"How do you think I feel, having to deal with puberty _twice_?" she shot back.

If they had been in their original bodies, hearing such suggestions wouldn't warrant more than a raised eyebrow. But in these much younger bodies, all that went out the window.

Their current selves were ruled by hormones which were only tempered by decades of experience and memories. When Erik hit puberty a second time he knew what to expect...but he also acknowledged it wasn't going to be fun at _all._ And knowing Raven like he did, she wouldn't hesitate to try and flirt with him if only to get a reaction.

He had to admit though...if he had to chose between the world they came from to the one they were in now, he would honestly say he liked this one slightly better.

Here they weren't hated for their gifts, but celebrated for them. Raven's gift made her more than just a valuable asset...it made her a very desirable partner. Even if the whole 'old blood versus new blood' sometimes made him sick, it was infinitely better than having to deal with the bullshit of people like Stryker and that foolish senator he had used as a lab rat. He could honestly say they were much happier here than they were before. Raven could actually laugh and not have it sound fake.

The closest equivalent to what they endured in their old world was the debate about werewolves. It was rather ironic...one had to be born with the mutant gene in order to have any powers, but here you could be bitten and turned.

And yet they were treated as little more than animals. Some of the laws he had seen in the magical books had made him sick... if he ever met this Delores Umbridge she'd soon wish for death by the time he was through with her.

He had a zero-tolerance policy for people like her...anyone who thought making it impossible for someone to have children because of a genetic condition didn't deserve his mercy.

Apparition was not something he liked. At all.

"I know, it's terrible, but at least I'm better at it than Nymph is. She can't even side-along without the high chance of someone splinching," said Raven.

"So why are we in what appears to be Knockturn?"

"Well I figured we could get you a pet and start your contacts list with some of the other species...specifically vampires. Vincent has the werewolves covered, but we'll need more than them if we plan to give these idiots a rude awakening," said Raven. "Why do you want a cat anyway?"

"Two words. Laser pointer."

Raven snickered.

"You do realize that those aren't likely to work in Hogwarts, right?"

"You do realize I could probably convince the Ravenclaws into creating a spell that allows me to do the same thing without having to get batteries, right? Either that or a low-powered lightning rune will take care of it," said Erik.

Besides, the idea of seeing the pure blood's expressions to something as innocent as a laser pointer was going to be good...not to mention there was a high chance he could drive Filch crazy by having his familiar chase it around the castle for hours on end.

Odds were the twins would have it banned from the castle within a month because of McGonagall's animagus form.

Coming to this world had restored a sense of whimsy and humor in him that he had lost because of Shaw and the memory of his mother's death. Here he didn't have to try and shoulder the burden of protecting fellow mutants from the stupidity of a small portion of humanity, but rather be a normal child...even if he was closer to McGonagall's age than Harry's.

* * *

The vampire was amused, at first, when he was introduced to Erik. Raven was well known in the creature community about not really giving a damn about what they were so long as they didn't do something stupid like try to kill or turn her. With decades of martial arts experience and the ability to quite literally turn into any creature she had extensive knowledge of, she was a very effective spy and assassin.

Having a massive dragon staring down at you ready to rip your head off if you tried to be rude or kill the person who had contacted you was one of her favorite tricks.

It was also for that reason why Fenrir Greyback had never come within fifty yards of her after her mother had nearly put the feral werewolf into Azkaban...or better yet have him killed. And since he couldn't be sure he was biting her sister and not the infamous Raven, he left her alone...though he would kill her the first chance he got if he caught her alone.

The vampire listened to Erik's proposal, and noted the way he held himself with approval.

This boy wasn't expecting trouble or planning to cause it, but he was ready to fight his way out if necessary.

The vampire liked the kid too much to want to eat him. And the refreshing way he viewed the world only made it better.

"I can guarantee the neutrals will agree to your terms, but the older ones will need more than that and some of the younger idiots might need a reminder that they need to keep their egos in check."

"Can you set up a meeting with the Veela?"

"You'd have better luck asking your werewolf friend, if they're even willing to associate with him because of his father."

"Hmm. What about the dwarves?"

"They've been in decline every since the wizards decided to give Goblins a monopoly on the gold market after their spats," said the vampire. "Though their work is still better than goblin-made, but it's what the modern wizard is used to."

Erik had an idea of how to approach the dwarves, who were famous in many cultures for being expert miners and metal workers.

Odds were they'd be happy to negotiate once they found out his affinity for metal and the ability to detect it even deep underground. If he could locate an until-now untapped mine of rare or valuable metal (such as platinum), then there was a good chance they might be able to make a comeback.

At the very least they would be easier to deal with than goblins.

Though to be fair his bias mostly stemmed from the fact he had always been a fan of _Lord of the Rings_ , and the more recent movies based on the book before it (even if they did skew the book quite a bit to make it more interesting) on _The Hobbit_ meant he wasn't likely to trust his money with the diminutive beings any time soon.

Raven had already started to move her gold far, far from their greedy little hands and some of Harry's trust fund (he had given her open permission to use or move his vault shortly after moving in with the Tonks family...as far as Dumbledore knew he was on vacation with the Durselys in Majorca) and into muggle banks where the interest rate was much better.

Even if it was in an off-shore bank where the mundane side of English tax accountants couldn't touch the thing without causing all sorts of headaches for their lawyers.

Besides, it was only a fraction of what was actually in the Potter main vault.

The only issue being that he had no idea where to find actual dwarves, and even less idea of how to convince them he wasn't trying to screw them over.

They left the meeting feeling like they had accomplished something...and with a new pet that had to be put into a special container for apparition which rarely agreed with animals.

Surprisingly Raven had a bought a cat while they were out, and after a swipe from it's claws for forcing it to endure apparition, it curled around her shoulders. One that had a smashed in face and a very intelligent gaze that she named Charles...after the pain in the neck psychic that they both knew so well.

The very thought of that cat being named after his old friend/rival made them both laugh. And wondered how he would react to meeting his feline namesake.

"You do realize I'll be using my new pet to annoy the living daylights out of Vincent, right?" said Raven evilly.

"Are werewolves allergic?"

"More like cats hate them," said Raven, snickering.

"Keep me out of the blast range and you can irritate him all you want," deadpanned Erik.

Mystique and Sabertooth had a love/hate relationship. They couldn't stand each other, but they put up with the other's...unique...personality when they had to. So long as Sabertooth never came within ten yards of Mystique after he got wet, because he reeked to high heaven and rarely bathed except when they locked the feral mutant in a room and had Magneto attack him with metal-backed brushes and soap.

Erik snorted, remembering Mystique's favorite insult during those days.

"What?" she asked.

"At least your favorite insult will have a double meaning here," he clarified.

Raven blinked, before her smile turned predatory and mischievous.

Whenever Sabertooth was forced into taking a bath (or on the rare occasions he did it voluntarily) she would cattily tell him that at least now he didn't smell of 'wet dog'.

"Honestly I think the only reason we even tolerated each other was because you made us," said Raven.

Sabertooth was good for one thing and one thing only. He could tear a deer in half with his bare claws and was absolute devastating in a fight. Pretty much a berserker that ran on animal instinct and impulse, with the intelligence and cruelty of a human. The polar opposite of Mystique, who was finesse and subtlety.

If Sabertooth was, well, a saber tooth tiger, then Mystique was a panther on the prowl. All lithe grace and sharp claws.

Erik didn't doubt that idea for a moment. Sabertooth was an...acquired taste...while Mystique had always been able to slip into any group she wanted so long as they were loyal to her and didn't bore her to tears. Honestly, the only reason she chose him over Charles was because he was more charismatic and less of a pacifist, which suited her nature better.

Not to mention he had more of a use for her transformation abilities than Charles did.

* * *

"Big sister Nymph!"

"Oomph!"

Raven snickered, and watched as her little friend Luna Lovegood (she had a subscription to the Quibbler and they found her endlessly fascinating for giving them a rough guesstimate of what the animals they came up with looked like based on their description, enough said) talked a mile a minute with Nymphadora about her new wand and the latest creature in the Quibbler.

Raven met Luna Lovegood shortly after she decided to turn into a "Crumple-Horned Snorkack" as a joke to see if she could do imaginary creatures as well. Nymph, being the excitable and clumsy girl that she was, took pictures and jokingly sent them to the Quibbler.

The Lovegoods showed up three days later, to Ted's amusement and Andromeda's mortification. And after Selene Lovegood died, Raven and Nymph took little Luna in under their wing as their baby sister.

Which pretty much meant Xenophilius used the two as baby sitters whenever he went into some dangerous territory and didn't want to risk his precious daughter.

Because this was going to be Luna's first year at Hogwarts, Erik and Harry had agreed to watch out for the girl and to keep the likes of Draco Malfoy from harassing her...despite being second cousins.

Luna had a...unique...way of seeing the world around her, leading to a rather derogatory nickname among the other pure blood girls as "Loony" Lovegood. Which only made her gravitate towards Raven and Nymph that more strongly.

As long as she was as useful as Raven claimed (having trained the girl to use her uniqueness to her advantage when it came to gathering rumors) Erik could care less what off-the-wall things the blond said.

Besides, he was used to taking in oddballs.


	7. Chapter 7

**_ATTENTION! ATTENTION! DUE TO THE RECENT VIRUS ATTACK ON MY WRITING COMPUTER, ALL UPDATES WILL BE SLOW OR NONEXISTENT UNTIL THE COMPUTER IS FIXED. I DO HAVE MOST OF ADAMANTIUM DONE (UP TO CHAPTER 20) AND UP TO CHAPTER 4 OF IT'S IN THE BLOOD. I WILL CONTINUE TO UPDATE THOSE UNTIL THE COMPUTER IS FIXED._**

* * *

Erik watched with amusement at the expression on Harry's face when he saw the small amount of what most modern children would consider outdated weapons.

The first was a simple bow and arrow, made of metal because it would last longer...and so Erik could give minor corrections without having to be present. The arrows themselves were hand carved, with only the feathers needing to be added courtesy of a spell. They were little more than sharpened sticks, but they were perfect for a beginner like Harry.

The second was a bokken, generally used to teach kendo and kenjutsu. As Harry had demonstrated a _reasonable_ amount of competence in knife fighting, even if he had only just barely mastered the basics of fighting dirty courtesy of a very enthusiastic Raven who knew that boredom was looming around the corner once they went to school.

Considering she was likely to graduate early from the magical equivalent of college thanks to the rather generous gift of a time turner from Lucius Malfoy who had deemed her interesting enough to pay precious gold to bribe the goblins for two. Though whether the second would go to Draco was highly debatable, because as much as he had spoiled his son growing up the boy had yet to display anything worthy of proving himself a Malfoy outside of having the blood.

Narcissa had told her favorite niece that there was a very good chance he might gift the rare gift of such a useful magical artifact to her 'boyfriend', which was what Andromeda jokingly called Erik.

To be fair, the only one who maintained her interest and happened to be 'male' was Erik, and that was because he didn't bore her to tears within a week.

The third and final thing was a paintball gun, though the 'paintballs' were in actuality potions that would splatter spectacularly within contact of anything warm. The outside was flash frozen with a spell, while the main liquid was kept safe inside. The outer skin was so thin that it would break upon contact.

Harry's eyes gleamed, as he could already see the applications of such a trick. Odds were he had already slated his first target.

"You're not old enough or mature enough to handle real guns, but paintballs are fairly harmless and it will give you experience on maintaining a real fire arm. Be careful of the cartridges though, because they _can_ be deadly in the right circumstances," said Erik.

"The twins are doomed," cackled Harry.

"I'll show you how to make the ammo so you can nail them with prank potions later," said Erik, having been present when Raven created them.

"Speaking of the twins...who's up to visiting the Weasley's for a bit?" said Raven.

"Why?" said Erik.

"Charlie's in for a week," said Raven by way of explanation.

Andromeda snickered.

Charlie and Raven had dated, briefly, before her infamous boredom set in and they parted ways. Molly had been so disappointed, but Narcissa was pleased.

That didn't mean they weren't still friends though. They had a shared love of dragons, particularly when Raven first demonstrated her ability to shapeshift _into_ one during one memorable transfiguration lesson.

Narcissa was just pleased she wouldn't have to contend with Molly as an in-law, even if she wasn't Raven's actual mother.

The woman had the largest set of lungs in existence, as she demonstrated repeatedly while sending one of her infamous howlers.

Erik had made a few favors with the twins by giving them a charm that would filter out their mother's harridan voice, and then netted quite a bit of coin selling it to the other students and some of the teachers. It essentially made Molly Weasley's voice about the same pitch as that of a dog whistle to the ears, thus making it impossible for humans to hear.

Unless you were a werewolf, of course.

Vincent had better thank him for getting an iron-clad agreement not to use those charms on him around howlers, because Raven had been seriously tempted.

It was like managing toddlers who hated each other with those two.

* * *

"Why am I not surprised Hagrid tried to raise a dragon in his hut," sighed Erik, though this was the first he was hearing of it.

The visit to the Weasley house had been _almost_ a disaster. The older boys were alright, but Molly Weasley was a nightmare. He could see why Raven hadn't exactly been enthusiastic around her.

She was a mother hen on overdrive and she coddled the children far too much. No wonder Ron was such a slob and a headache to be around.

Fortunately she wasn't so inclined to do the same to Erik...probably because he was a Slytherin.

In order to avoid even more headache, he took Arthur Weasley aside and explained to him patiently that he was from Germany and Jewish, and therefor had even _less_ reason to like Voldemort than most half-bloods.

It wasn't until Raven reminded Arthur of Grindlewald's views on muggleborns caught by Hitler that he understood.

Muggleborns caught by the muggle half of the war generally ended up staying in the camps unless they displayed a particularly strong gift towards magic...and their treatment was only worse if they were Jewish.

Arthur clearly thought Erik was the son of a German wizard who had been put into one of those camps.

He did chuckle at the way Ginerva Weasley, the youngest and only girl, kept looking at Harry out of the corner of her eyes...yet she was too shy to at least talk to him.

He foresaw a lot of visits from Harry to avoid his obvious fan girl.

And a lot of visits from Luna so she'd have a decent sparring partner. Now that he had a rough idea of his physical level in his much younger body, he was going to put himself through a strenuous work out to get back to a more suitable level for him. And that meant relearning old moves and a lot of exercise. Odds were Harry and Neville would join him.

It would be a good way to kill time until third year, which was when Raven said their schooling would pick up.

Second year was mostly a revision of the basics and some minor preparation for when they chose their electives.

So far Erik had picked Ancient Runes, COMC, and a rather obscure branch of magic that was only available by request...which normally only the pure bloods knew about.

It was called enchanting. Specifically things like engraving and etching of runes or other magics to do special effects. Alchemy was only available to those with high enough grades in potions, herbology, transfiguration and of course, runes. Arithimancy was recommended, but not required.

It was a pretty rare and study-intensive art, hence why so few wizards bothered with it. They were lazy.

Enchanting would be an interesting way to kill time and do something productive, considering his ability towards metal.

Raven, for example, had chosen to pursue the Black's ancestral path. Which was blood runes, transfiguration, and strangely enough nature magic. The Black family were originally druids from Ireland, according to Walburga's portrait. She was rather pleased Raven had taken the title and not her 'worthless son' Sirius.

And, much to Erik's dismay, Raven agreed to escort the twins and Erik to Diagon so they could collect their school things. This was mainly because Molly Weasley had a major issue with Slytherins and even more issue with one near her youngest children.

He didn't know the source of her animosity, nor did he care. So long as she didn't turn her wand on him just because of what house he was sorted in, he could care less if she jumped off her roof starkers.

* * *

"Who or _what_ is Gilderoy Lockhart? And why does the very name give me such an ominous feeling?" said Erik.

"Oh magic, not _him_!" said Raven, looking with horror at the poster.

"Oh great, it's the man-whore," said Nymph in disgust.

Andromeda would have chastised them about their language, but to be honest she disliked the little sycophant herself. Nymph had the right of it...the blond fop was a bloody media man-whore.

Instead of going in immediately, like Molly was doing, Andromeda dragged the children instead to where the animals were, if only to delay their inevitable entrance into the mob of females and their irritated husbands/boyfriends/sons.

Hopefully they could gain the books they didn't already have (with Raven and Nymph passing on their school books since they rarely changed over the years since the latest edition came out) once he was gone, and if not then Erik, Harry and the twins would have to contend with second hand.

She bypassed the generic pet store, and the owl emporium. If Erik planned to get a pet, then she would get one that suited him and not something that looked 'cool'. Or in the case of her oldest daughter, something to annoy one of her friends with.

Charles was definitely at least half-kneazle, and according to her there was a high chance he was more intelligent than Mrs. Norris, the annoying old Maine Coon that the caretaker owned.

Harry went along, seeing as how he had gotten Hedwig as a present and was curious as to the different types of pets the magical world had to offer.

What they entered was nothing less than a menagerie of animals that people could only dream of.

"Welcome to my shop," said a rather mysterious Chinese man with short hair that just barely touched the shoulders.

"Count D," greeted Andromeda.

"Mrs. Tonk-Black. Has your daughter reconsidered my offer...?"

"Raven said she might come to work here part time while she continues her education thanks to a time turner my brother-in-law gifted her recently. But we are here to insure one of my wards receives a proper companion, and not some over-breed nightmare."

Count D was a Chinese Pure Blood (or so he claimed) who had taken one look at Raven and offered her a job as his assistant. He made it quite clear that he had no interest in her as a 'wife', as he could see the threads of fate on others and hers clearly lead to someone else. However he could always use an assistant as unique as Raven.

Raven was currently wandering around a used book store in hopes of finding something decent to read.

"Which one of the boys?"

"Um, I was just hoping to browse a bit. I already have an owl," said Harry.

"Perhaps a companion for your own then? If you go down the hall and take the third door on the left you'll find my collection of birds and owls," said D.

Harry followed a kitsune to where the aviary was, and gladly went to greet the birds inside. He liked birds.

"Now as for this one. He will be a tricky one to match, that is for certain."

Count D seemed to observe Erik rather thoroughly before having the 'boy' follow him into the back.

Andromeda stayed in the main foyer, because this sort of thing was a type of ritual ceremony in itself.

"You're like Raven aren't you? You're not a child, but you weren't originally a magical either."

"I woke up on the train with no idea how I became eleven or why I was there."

"I should warn you that some of my pets come with...conditions or rules. Rules that if broken will mean we hold no liability over what happens to you later. Most of the wizards avoid my shop because of it."

"Most magicals are either ignorant, idiots, or allow their foolish house prejudice to get in the way. So long as the rules are reasonable I don't mind."

Count D's smile was a bit warmer. Clearly he had said the right thing.

"Here we are. This is where some of our special request or pets are kept. They are often quite rare...and very deadly if handled incorrectly."

Count D allowed Erik to wander around. He saw creatures he had only thought were myths from the old country. Then he saw it.

A bird with the most luxurious of feathers and a regal gaze.

"I thought I was familiar with most legends, but I can't seem to figure out which type of bird that is. It's not a tengu or a phoenix is it?"

"You are well read. It is Asian, but it produces something the opposite of what a phoenix would."

That narrowed down the list.

"Is it Chinese by any chance?"

"Yes."

"That bird is a Zhen isn't it?"

Zhen were birds from Chinese folklore said to consume poisonous plants, which lead to a very deadly poison in their feathers. If a single feather were to be added to a cup of wine, it would produce a poison so potent there would be no cure. On the same hand, if given blood freely by a living Zhen it would cure any poison.

"This little one is quite young, but still rather potent. Her sister has been getting worried because she was trying to rush in growing up...so some time with children her own age would be good for her. Unfortunately because of what she is, most won't allow her to come within fifty feet of their own children," said Count D.

Erik thought that one over, before asking "One of the conditions to tricking that senile goat in the castle wouldn't be to keep her true nature a secret, would it?"

"No. It's unlikely he'd even recognize her for what she is unless someone told him. All her sister requested was that I find an 'owner' who wouldn't take advantage of her and would treat her well. Though if you did abuse her I'm sure this little one would make sure you knew it pretty quickly."

He had little doubt of that.

"I suppose I could use a 'secretary' of sorts to keep my appointments straight. Raven always hated having to do that and preferred spy work to doing paperwork or anything near it. And it will keep the other girls from trying to latch onto me later, since Raven is no longer a student. So does she have a name?"

"Ryoku-En."

"Ryoku-chan then," said Erik.

The Zhen flew off her perch and onto his arm. She would turn into a girl later.

The rules for keeping her were simple enough. He couldn't abuse her in any way, if she found her 'destined mate' then she was free to leave at any time, and he wasn't to keep her from visiting with her sister.

So long as she remained loyal and didn't try to kill him, get on his nerves as quickly as Granger had, or help his enemies, he could care less what she did.

* * *

Erik, Ryoku and Count D entered the main shop to find a rather amusing predicament.

Harry had a bird on his shoulder, one that refused to return to the others. Though it wasn't really a bird, but merely wore the shape of one.

"Ah. I'm surprised _he_ took to a wizard. He's been quite vocal about refusing to find an owner since I found him."

It was in the shape of a black owl with odd ornaments around the neck. The tail was rather long, and the eyes were wide. But the most unusual thing about it was that the owl-thing could speak.

Count D had found it shortly after the death of a rather interesting line of wizards. The remnants of it's soul were just floating around until he collected it and placed it into a new vessel. For demons such as the 'owl', physical bodies were unimportant at best. It merely returned to the shape it had held for the longest time, though it's true form was locked until it's next owner could find something to replace what it had lost.

The owl couldn't bring back the dead (even with a contract), but it could still provide an honest conversation. It had a similar love of sweets that D himself had, and a penchant for chocolate parfaits.

To find him forcibly choosing a wizard, of all things, was quite extraordinary.

"I already have an owl. I don't know if Hedwig would allow me to have another one."

" _She can stuff it for all I care. Do you have any idea how long I've waited here for someone with the right affinity for me?!_ " said the demon crankily.

Considering the mess that had occurred before his first 'death', it was only natural he was unwilling to let go of the only magical who had the capacity to even remotely access his power. Though considering how weak he was, he wouldn't be reviving the dead anytime soon.

Seeing the dilemma, Count D offered a solution.

"If this 'Hedwig' of yours objects too much, I could always have a chat with her and explain things. As it stands the odds of him finding an owner with the proper affinity are pretty low... particularly with all this foolishness about bloodlines going on."

As it turned out, Hedwig would need a _long_ talk with the odd Chinese wizard before she even allowed the rather cranky Stolas in her "chick's" presence.

Though Erik couldn't wait to explain how he had gained a secretary of sorts and someone who could keep an eye on Luna at the same time.

It wasn't that he didn't think Ryoku could handle being a Slytherin (not with him unofficially leading the house of snakes from within at any rate), but more along the lines of he wanted a crack at the 'private' library that the Ravenclaw dorm was rumored to hold, and at the same time protecting a girl he now viewed as a younger sister, if only because Raven did.

If the children thought calling her Loony Lovegood was acceptable, then odds were they wouldn't hesitate to bully the girl, even if she could kick their arses without any trouble.


	8. Chapter 8

**Happy _(belated)_ birthday to OfTheErised! Sorry I couldn't post this on the 7th like you asked, but I wasn't aware that it was Labor Day until it was too late.  
**

* * *

"I think I'm going to be sick," said Erik, once he heard the news.

Five minutes in the man's presence had been enough for him to get a read on this...Lockhart. He was a media whore, one who wouldn't hesitate to be a massive nuisance if he thought it would give him even _more_ glory he didn't deserve. Odds were he had stolen the credit off of others.

So the fact he was going to be their _Defense_ teacher this year...it made Erik nauseous.

"What are you complaining about? If this guy's a glory hound like you say he is, then you know he's going to be on me like white on rice!"

Behind them, Stolas and Ryoku were eating their chocolate parfaits while watching the amusing show. Ryoku would be going to Hogwarts as an 'exchange student' from China, and would go into whatever house Luna did to keep her from being bullied. Luna had accepted this decision with ease, primarily because she was fascinated by the bird-girl and had high hopes that she might know the location of some of their more...unusual...creatures that were featured in their magazine.

If nothing else she could hold interviews with Count D and his pets.

"And to add to that headache..." grimaced Harry, and Erik snickered.

"You have a die-hard fan girl coming to Hogwarts. From what I've seen though, she's more likely to stare at you from afar than to bother you."

"Don't remind me," groaned Harry. It was bad enough getting the 'Talk' from someone he practically considered his older brother at this point, but ever since learning Ginny (she apparently didn't like being called by her full name of Ginerva, much like Ron hated being called "Ronald") was a fan girl he had gone over his experiences with females and immediately came to the unpleasant realization that a good chunk of the girls he talked to or in his year were fan girls. _His_ fan girls to be exact.

Considering what he knew of fan girl hordes when they got to a certain point, he was quite naturally terrified of them. Though Erik still found it amusing Harry was an Otaku, just not a rabid one.

The funny thing being that Erik was the one to teach Harry how to speak Japanese, despite being German.

When you lived as long as he had and did half of the traveling he did, you tended to pick up languages as a habit. And he had been in Japan long enough to pick up the language, though reading was another story.

For that he usually asked Raven to do it, because her extensive training in spy craft meant she was well versed in more languages than he was, which including the written form. Less headache inducing than trying to struggle through a dictionary and hope you got the translation right.

There was a curse in the room above them, and Harry briefly glanced up.

"She still having trouble with the goblins?"

"Apparently because of the minor complication of Sirius being directly related to the last head, and the fact he named you as his heir they're refusing to relinquish the ring and the titles without getting his signature."

"So what's the real problem?" asked Harry.

"Supposedly this Sirius Black was the reason why your parents were murdered, but the story didn't really make much sense to me unless the man was as good at deception as Raven is...and according to Narcissa he most certainly wasn't."

"How so?"

"Well for starters, according to rumors he viewed your father as his brother in all but blood, despite being second cousins once removed. He's also notorious for his dislike of 'dark' spells, going so far as to step up the usual disdain of anything Slytherin related, even for a Gryffindor. It's also apparently why he was thrown out of the house at sixteen, because he refused to have anything to do with the family name or their magics."

"And?"

"And according to the official story, he betrayed your parents that night to Voldemort, and then killed twelve humans and the fourth member of their gang by the name of Peter Pettigrew. All they found was his finger, if what I heard is right."

Harry blinked. Being around Erik, he didn't have to dumb down his intelligence...and something about that story didn't sit right.

"Wait. If they were practically blood brothers and he quite vocally hated anything 'dark' or Slytherin related, then why would he betray my parents before going after another mere days later?"

"Raven's trying to locate the trial records to have the title of Head of Black stripped according to the magical customs, but either they were misfiled or..."

"Or they threw him into Azkaban without bothering to get the full story."

Hearing someone stomp down the stairs, they were mildly surprised to see Raven's enraged expression.

"Nothing. There isn't a _single_ record outside of the barest of evidence collected by the Aurors, or even a word-for-word account of a veritaserum testimony."

"What's..."

"It's a truth serum made so that one cannot lie if taken correctly. Three drops for an adult, one for an adolescent or underage child. However it can be worked around if one is aware enough and skilled enough," explained Raven. Her eyes flashed angrily. "I believe I will have a word with Aunt Narcissa about this nonsense."

It wasn't that Raven cared about an innocent man in jail. Far from it. But without trial records and a confirmed guilty verdict by his peers which was sealed by the Supreme Mugwump, there was no way she could rightfully claim the title of Heir to the Ancient and Noble House of Black. And that pissed her off.

If Sirius Black _had_ been thrown into the prison without a proper trial, and turned out to be innocent, then Raven would make sure that he received full reparations from those responsible...which were the Minister and Supreme Mugwump. The thought of emptying Dumbledore's coffers was a pleasing one.

If he was in fact responsible for nearly ending a magical line like everyone believed, then nothing would change outside of Raven getting her rightful due legally.

In either scenario, she would come out on top one way or another. The only question would be how much of a nuisance this Sirius would become, and if so how difficult it would be to hide the fact Raven had killed him off.

If nothing else she could simply shoot him, but where was the fun in that? Not to mention the hassle of hiding the body from magic...

In any event, Raven would have to have a...discussion...with her aunt. Preferably with Lucius nearby, if only so he had a general idea of whether or not to pull the plug in concerns to bribing the Minister. Otherwise he might as well pay Raven directly.

* * *

"What."

"Sirius Black never got a trial, or if he did the records were lost or misfiled. Without it I can't take the title from him, and if he's innocent...well, Lucius may as well pay me directly considering where Fudge gets most of his disposable income," said Raven flatly.

Narcissa looked annoyed.

"And since without his approval you can't become the head of the Black family..."

"And why, exactly, should we insure your rather irritating cousin gets a trial? If he's innocent he could cause a lot of problems for us," said Lucius.

"If he's guilty, fine, then the only thing that changes is that I take the title by default. But consider this, Uncle. If he's _innocent_ , then Dumbledore bungled his job and you have a _legal_ reason that not even his own people would consider acceptable to oust him as Supreme Mugwump. He'd still be headmaster, but he wouldn't be able to annoy us in the Wizangamot. And I _know_ he's botched his duty with the security of the school, because last year a fully grown mountain troll got in...not to mention he deliberately taunted the children to all but seek danger by forbidding them from going to the third floor corridor, which is tantamount to daring them, particularly where the Weasley twins are concerned."

Lucius blinked, before he went to find Draco to confirm this particular tidbit. If that was true then he might have a chance to get rid of the biggest headache, which had always been Dumbledore. His position in the ICW was out of his hands, but if they could get him out of the position as Headmaster and Supreme Mugwump, then it might not matter.

Draco not only confirmed there had been a troll and that the headmaster had all but dared them to seek out what was on the third floor, but he also told the students to return to their dorms...even though the Slytherins and Hufflepuffs were in the dungeons, which was where the troll had been spotted last!

Lucius' smile was predatory.

"Do you think your...friend...Erik would be willing to report any more incidents?"

"Give him a reason to report it, and he will."

"Oh? What would he consider worth his while?"

"He might ask you for a favor later, or support. The last thing he's interested is capital, but he would be interested in power. He's also not a very big fan of Dumbledore, and he will not hesitate to _kill_ Voldemort if they ever cross paths."

Lucius blinked.

"What does he have against the Dark Lord?"

"It's nothing personal, but he really hates Voldemort's stand on bloodlines. The fact he's willing to kill muggleborns for no other reason than the fact they're first generation magicals pisses him off like nothing else."

Lucius raised an eyebrow.

"He's more likely to discriminate against muggles than he is against muggleborns."

To Magneto, "muggles" or 'regular humans', weren't worth much note...unless they started to persecute mutants...or in this case magicals. Then he got nasty in a hurry. So long as both sides coexisted peacefully as equals, he could care less.

Lucius seemed to accept that. So long as he wasn't a die-hard "muggle lover" like Dumbledore, his stance on the whole blood issue was acceptable.

"Very well. I'll see to that Black gets his day in court. If we're lucky Dumbledore will have made an even bigger mistake with Black."

"So he's getting a trial?"

"We'll be in Hogwarts when it starts. You can attend once it's underway, but it won't change anything outside of having yet another family member out of the prison. Andromeda has legal custody of you in _both_ worlds."

Gold goes a long way, and she had registered Harry as her 'son' with the Ministry. Even if Black was innocent, he'd have to at the very least go to therapy for a while if he even wanted to _visit_ with Harry alone.

"...So what are we going to do with Lockhart?"

"If he's too annoying I was thinking of bursting the pipes above his office," said Erik.

"Shouldn't be too hard... those pipes must be centuries old, and I doubt they've been serviced or replaced," said Harry. Already grinning at the chance of chaos.

"I can see it now... 'Students, I regret to inform you that due to an accident with the pipes, you will have to learn the water charm early and limit your bathroom usage'," said Erik, mimicking Dumbledore's voice fairly accurately.

"Be sure to share the memory if you do wreck the pipes," said Raven.

"And thanks for waiting for us to graduate first before you did," added Nymph.

"Think we could get the Weasleys twins in on this?"

"I was thinking we get them instead. Any ideas?"

"You could always ask Myrtle," suggested Raven a little too evilly.

Nymph blinked before letting out a guffaw of evil laughter.

"Who's Myrtle?"

"A ghost girl who died about fifty years ago in the girl's bathroom on the second floor. From what I've been able to ascertain (mostly out of sheer boredom) she was killed by a basilisk or something similar, since the only thing she remembers was a pair of large yellow eyes before finding out she had died without any realization at all of what happened."

"She likes to flood the girl's bathroom regularly, and because she died right after hitting puberty she's still very hormonal because she never had the chance to stabilize," said Nymph.

"I thought ghosts lost their hormones once they died?" asked Harry.

"They do, but apparently some of it managed to stick with her, because even the littlest thing causes her to goes off in a snit and floods the place," said Nymph.

"I do believe I've found my new favorite prank of the year. Just as a head's up, I'm going to have her haunt your tower and possibly Draco's bathroom," said Erik.

"Be sure to record him screaming like a girl. No offense."

"None taken. Draco is rather feminine, even for a boy," snickered Raven.

"Only if you record the twin's reaction to my prank," said Erik, eyes gleaming.

"Deal."

* * *

It was a rather...tense...summer for Vincent. Partly because his 'father' was insisting he join in on the pack revels, but mostly because of a certain nuisance known as Remus Lupin, who was a die-hard Dumbledore supporter.

The werewolf, who unfortunately happened to be one of his father's many victims, clearly suspected the son of the one who cursed him to be up to something nefarious. Blood will tell and all that rot.

Naturally the older werewolf clearly suspected he was up to no good, or recruiting for his father, so he made it his personal mission to snoop. Which was highly irritating, but not something that would have Vincent in the mood to end him.

Unfortunately for Lupin, Vincent was an old hand at spotting tails, and an even better hand at recruiting without having to say as much.

All he was doing was spreading the word of a potential new Alpha, one who wasn't wolf, but wouldn't hide behind his status as a neutral party like Dumbledore. He also wasn't a supporter of the last Dark Lord, who Fenrir backed openly.

Any wolf who had gotten a good scent of the infamous Lord Voldemort knew the man wasn't an Alpha, but followed him only because Fenrir did and they didn't want to challenge the feral werewolf Pack leader.

As it was now obvious Vincent either wanted to establish a pack separate from his father, or was seeking to challenge him of the title of Pack leader in the future, the werewolves would at least listen.

All of which was perfectly acceptable according to the werewolf pecking order, and nothing Remus could take back to his 'owner', as Vincent like to think of the old goat.

Of course if the older Beta didn't back off, Vincent was going to give him a message...one that he wasn't likely to forget in a hurry. Nothing said back the hell off like a few broken bones.


	9. Chapter 9

The first clue Sirius Black had that something was going to happen was that he was moved away from the maximum security wing and into a less patrolled wing. Normally this either happened because of visitors wishing a discreet discussion, or because there was something even more unlikely going on... a precursor to a trial.

Considering he had been thrown into this hellhole without one, he was hoping it was the second, but expecting the first.

So naturally he was caught off guard when a very pretty, quite obviously Slytherin witch, walked in wearing something that could only be muggle...along with his second-least-favorite cousin Narcissa. His second favorite cousin Andromeda was right behind her, along with what had to be her daughter Nymphadora.

Which meant the first witch could be her other daughter Raven, though that begged the question, what the bloody hell did they want with him after so long?

"Ugh... I can't say Azkaban did you any favors, you annoying mutt," said Narcissa, her nose curling in disgust.

"Good to see you to, Cissy," Sirius shot back. Narcissa blinked, not expecting anything _that_ coherent from him. He had been in the maximum security wing for eleven years and even Bellatrix had succumbed to the aura of the Dementors by this point.

The first witch snorted in amusement.

"She hates being call 'Cissy'."

"I know, who did you think made her hate it to begin with?" said Sirius smirking.

'Sissy Cissy' was his favorite taunt while they were growing up...which made her hate it when it spread among the Slytherins first year. She made it a taboo word around her by the time she hit puberty, as anyone stupid enough to call her that got hexed and spent three days in the hospital wing.

The first witch snorted again.

"Almost makes me hope you're innocent, if only to have someone else to help me torment uncle Lucius."

Okay, now he knew that was Raven.

"So what do you want? Not that I'm complaining, mind you, but I doubt you're here for just a chat."

"Simple really. We need you to agree to hand over the title as Head of the Black family over, and in exchange you'll get a trial. I am assuming you never got one from the lack of records I found," said Raven flatly.

"I'm not handing it over to the son of a Death Eater," growled Sirius.

"Draco is still a first year and already being groomed as head of the Malfoy family," said Raven, slightly amused.

"The one you'll be handing it over to is her," said Nymphadora, and she was pointing at her own sister.

"I'm also not handing it over to a bloody Slytherin."

"I was the Hufflepuff Head Girl, for your information. No one suspects a Hufflepuff," said Raven, definitely amused now. Likely because she was shooting down his arguments.

Sirius blinked.

"No way you were a Puff."

"I'm a Slytherin at heart, but I have all the loyalty of a Puff. So I told that dodgy old hat to put me in the same house as my sister, if only so I could keep an eye on her. And if it's any consolation to you, I once dated a Weasley and his harridan mother never once raised a voice in protest."

Sirius knew Molly. She was as overprotective as a mother dragon with a nest. If she hadn't raised any complaints, then she might be telling the truth about being a Hufflepuff.

"In any case the point is moot. Either you agree to forfeit the title to me, or I'll get it anyway if you're proven guilty."

"Why do you want the title so bad?"

"One, it will annoy Lucius' little group of idiots that a half-blood with a muggleborn father is head of an Ancient and Noble house. Two, it will give me more power to protect my favorite cousin, Harry. And three, because it also comes with a rather large vault that I intend to fill with gold."

Sirius went from casual to ramrod straight the second she mentioned Harry.

"How is he? Is he alright?"

Raven blinked, and she wasn't the only one.

"Harry is fine, now that we've successfully outmaneuvered Dumbledore and removed him from his muggle aunt's home. As I understand it, you were named his godfather, correct?"

"Magically bound godfather. If I had gotten a trial he never would have gone to... _Petunia_ ," spat Sirius. He had met Lily's sister once, and he was glad to never have the chance to meet her a second time.

"Wait, magically _bound_ godfather?" said Narcissa, sitting up at that.

"I'll say whatever you want against Dumbledore, hell, I'll even hand over the title... Just get me a damn trial and make sure that you use veritaserum."

Sirius' belief in the headmaster took a sharp blow the second he heard _why_ he was in prison without a trial. Any pure blood would know that if he _had_ betrayed the Potters, then his life would have been forfeit because it put Harry directly in danger from a known threat. Being a magically bound godfather was the equivalent of a magical oath. His own core would turn against him if he had done anything to harm his godson.

So yeah, he would speak badly against the old goat if it meant getting out of here and seeing Harry again.

"Would you be interested in switching to a side that won't kill muggleborns indiscriminately, but also isn't a hypocrite like Dumbledore?" asked Raven.

"What sort of side is that?" asked Andromeda sharply, though she had an inkling as to what was going on.

The way her daughter deferred to the German half-blood, even the son of Greyback listening to what were clearly orders from a half-blood...

Clearly they didn't believe Voldemort was dead, or if they did, they were planning to topple Dumbledore from his throne.

"My side. Or I should say it has always been _his_ side, now that he's back," said Raven simply.

"We will be talking about this later," said Andromeda.

"I expected nothing less, mother. So what is your choice Sirius Black? Will you side with Dumbledore once more if you're freed, or will you take a leap into the unknown and hope for the best?"

"If I join this third party... do you swear they won't target the muggles like Voldemort had a habit of doing? Or kill off entire lines just for choosing the 'wrong' side?"

"He's always been of the opinion of 'live and let live', unless the other side decides to do something stupid like persecute the magicals again. Then he'll get nasty and fight back, but for the most part he just wants real equality within the magicals. Even if it just giving the muggleborns an actual chance in our world so they don't go scurrying back to the muggle side," said Raven. "Magical blood is so hard to come by, and we could lose a chance to make some real progress if all we focus on is how old and how 'pure' it is."

"Heh... I could accept that kind of side. So long as it's not full of the same bullshit my dear 'mother' kept spouting or willing to leave an innocent man locked up in this hellhole without even a trial," said Sirius.

Raven smirked. Looked like she had secured a new recruit.

* * *

 _ **Sirius Black Innocent! Ministry and Supreme Mugwump to pay reparations for leaving innocent man in Azkaban without trial for over a decade!**_

Erik read the paper, with growing amusement. Raven had sent a letter along stating that they had secured yet another pure blood supporter for the Brotherhood, provided he didn't follow in Voldemort's footsteps or leave him hanging like Dumbledore had. She was also confirmed as Head of the Ancient and Noble House of Black shortly after Sirius was confirmed to be entirely innocent of the crime of almost ending the Potter family and killing Pettigrew.

However she was also quick to assure Erik that Sirius wouldn't be going within a hundred yards of his godson until he had completed at _least_ one year of therapy with a magically-aware professional. It had been one of the stipulations to Raven's demands the second he was confirmed innocent. A demand that the majority of the Wizangamot agreed to, if only because the idea of allowing a man who had spent eleven years in a place many would consider hell on earth near the 'Boy-Who-Lived' alone as a terrifying prospect.

Raven was already gathering evidence to boot the esteemed Headmaster out of the courts, and from there the position of Headmaster. He could keep his position in the ICW, but only because he couldn't _possibly_ make it any worse after the last war and the sheer amount of corruption in the Ministry.

She was slowly gathering allies in the form of the muggleborns who had been chased out due to lack of options in Magical Britain, and she had high hopes to gain enough force (in Erik's name, though she wasn't overtly stating as much) to clean out the Ministry itself and put only _their_ supporters into place.

Lucius had dropped the Minister like a dungbomb about to go off, at least until the reparations were paid in full...otherwise the discreet bribery would come to light which would lead to even more headaches. At least that was the excuse he gave the Minister, who was very unhappy about the idea but agreed it was for the best.

At least he didn't have to pay _nearly_ as much as Albus Dumbledore, who had been cut off from going near his brother's business by Raven, who voiced a concern that if he was that short of funds then he might use the Hog's Head tavern as collateral and accidentally bankrupt his brother Aberworth.

Something that ironically enough gained them _another_ supporter, as the brothers hadn't exactly been on the best of terms...and seeing how uncomfortable Albus had been when she cut him off like that made it even more unlikely Aberworth would report anything to his brother at all.

As it was, Sirius fully planned to contact his old friend Remus...if the man didn't read it in the news or hear about it from the other magical societies first.

Sirius seemed perfectly happy leaving Harry with the Tonks family, even if Raven was a bit too much like Narcissa for his taste. As long as she didn't suddenly start emulating Bellatrix, he could care less. And he definitely didn't care about what she needed the title as Head of the Black family, so long as she didn't support Voldemort or the bullshit he spewed. He never wanted to be the head of the Black family to start with.

Harry, when he read the article, seemed to be torn.

Fortunately Erik had a cure for that, especially since Lockhart had become even _more_ irritating of late.

The next morning, right as the second year Gryffindor/Slytherin DADA class were in full swing, the students were treated to an amusing, if smelly, incident in which the pipes right inside Lockhart's office burst without warning, as well as those right above the man. Several gallons of sewage and who knew what else were abruptly dumped onto the man, as students wisely scrambled to get out of the way.

Lockhart's reputation with the girls were shot once they got a good look at him under several tons of unmentionable substances.

Needless to say class was promptly canceled, and the few who were unlucky enough to be within the blast range were quick to head back to their dorms in hopes of getting clean.

The next morning Gryffindors were treated to the amusing spectacle of the Weasley Twins racing down the stairs in their skivvies shouting about a ghost in the toilet. They didn't get a good look at _which_ ghost it was, and by the time Sir Nicholas could be found it was already gone.

Either way it sparked an epidemic among the lions where they started to try and ward the bathrooms against a ghostly voyeur.

Harry's mood definitely improved after that.

Draco had been getting on his nerves, and frankly he didn't see _why_ he shouldn't prank the little shit.

So he waited until the brat was in taking an hour long shower, before he struck.

One moment Draco was putting potions in his hair (as a Malfoy did not lower himself to using muggle products) the next his toilet let out an ominous gurgle before the thing _exploded_ , and his own waste started to spray onto him, despite the admirable effort from the shower pipes.

He was not pleased, and Snape was baffled as to what was going on.

Erik had the feeling he had found his new favorite mass prank.

* * *

"Wait, you're telling me that the guy you follow is only _twelve_ and is currently wreaking havoc on the school?" said Sirius incredulous. A month of therapy had done wonders, though he was still in no condition to be around people for long periods. Halloween was coming soon.

"He's already dumped several tons of sewage onto the DADA sacrifice and caused a Malfoy to have to use a 'lesser' bathroom for two weeks," said Raven smugly. "And that's not taking into account the fact he convinced Moaning Myrtle to spy on the Gryffindor boys in the loo as a joke."

Sirius blinked, before he let out a bark of laughter at that. Not even James would have considered something that creative!

"And you're telling me this kid is a Slytherin?"

"According to him, the hat said he would have eaten the Ravenclaws alive," said Raven amused.

The irony being that he did more damage as a Slytherin than as a reclusive Ravenclaw. Though at least he was curtailing any support from the younger generation Voldemort would get the second time around, and unintentionally to boot.

"Hard to believe my godson is friends with a Slytherin..."

"To be fair, he's not a pure blood, British nor does he approve of Voldemort's agenda to wipe out everyone except those who have the right bloodlines. He's also been keeping Draco in check, with Lucius' blessing," said Raven. "Don't you have an appointment in another hour?"

"Yes, but I was hoping you'd have at least heard from Remus, seeing as how I've been staying here until I get back on my feet."

"Nothing so far, but there is _one_ person who might be able to contact him. The issue is that I'm not entirely fond of the idiot."

"I'll pay you to send a letter," said Sirius.

"I'll have Erik send it. He's more likely to respond to him since I'm more likely to waste his time for a laugh," said Raven.

* * *

When Vincent got the forwarded missive from Magneto, he cursed up a storm. Fortunately Karkaroff tended to give him three days off every month so he could go to the werewolf sanctuary for the full moon, even if he didn't actually _need_ it.

And wouldn't you know it, Remus Lupin happened to be there if only to find out what Vincent was up to. Instead of telling him to go back to England, he took the direct approach.

He confronted the older wolf, kicked his ass, then paid for a port key that would dump Remus inside the Gringotts that lead outside to Diagon Alley with the instructions they inform him of Sirius Black's new status. And then inform him that if he tried to go back to the mainland he'd get an even worse beating.


	10. Chapter 10

Halloween came upon them, though Erik's hope to continue a tradition he had accidentally spawned were nixed when Harry asked him if he wanted to attend a "Death Day Party" hosted by the Gryffindor ghost Nearly Headless Nick.

Naturally it sounded intriguing, though upon hearing the circumstances behind _how_ he got an invitation he made sure to speak to the ghost in question about making sure to provide food and drinks for the living as well as the dead.

Which in hindsight proved to be a smart move, after seeing the fare provided for the dead.

"Remind me again how you roped me into this?"

"Boredom, maybe?" said Harry.

"That and curiosity," said Erik, sighing. Then he perked up. "Still, at least now I can convince some more ghosts to prank the others with."

Moaning Myrtle was an unsurprisingly enthusiastic helper in pranking the Gryffindors. Peeves had also taken to the new pranks Erik had given him with disturbing glee. The Bloody Baron had made it clear he was not interested in _helping_ , but he also wouldn't reveal the source considering it was usually harmless pranks.

After all, the worst a ghost could do was watch you or embarrass you in the worst moments...like when you were getting hot and heavy with your girlfriend in a broom cupboard.

Erik had already busted Percy Weasley with his girlfriend Penelope thanks to Peeves telling him where the go and when. He now had blackmail material considering he had been quick to snap a picture of the two with less than all their clothing on...and hide the camera before Percy could confiscate it.

He shouldn't have picked a spot that was within distance of the Slytherin dorms, though the fact Erik had used his powers to levitate _himself_ a little faster than Percy could run made it easier.

Instant Prefect protection, at least until Percy graduated.

Erik turned to a shivering Neville, though whether it was nerves or the presence of so many ghosts was debatable. He was betting on the ghosts, because they kept drifting just a little too close to the lion cub.

Spotting the table, Harry, Neville, the twins, Ryoku, Luna, and Erik went to get some food and hopefully chat with the ghosts. As a history buff, Erik had a personal interest in talking with the ghosts to see what they remembered.

Ron might have come, but he had been too close to Hermione when Harry went to ask, and considering how Erik felt about her he felt it was probably not a good idea to bring her along.

Until she lost the chip in her shoulder and that bossy, know-it-all attitude, Erik wasn't likely to let her come within ten feet of him.

Strangely Harry's new pet owl, Stolas, insisted on joining them. He sat comfortably on Harry's left shoulder, as Hedwig had absolutely claimed his right. They had come to a compromise, but it was pretty clear Hedwig did not like Stolas around Harry for some reason.

"So what are your plans for Christmas this year Harry?"

"For now I plan to stay here. Not because I enjoyed it so much last year, but because Raven doesn't want to chance my godfather meeting me before he's had at least six months of therapy first. Better to be safe than sorry, even if he _is_ saner than most prisoners out of the high security wing."

Sirius Black was highly unstable, and had all the mentality of an older teenager. Which meant he was a bundle of hormones and aggression all wrapped in an adult body. Not exactly a good mixture, especially if Narcissa was to be believed about his actions in the past.

And if that wasn't enough, there were also some of the stories Snape had told Erik, when the 'boy' had inquired as to his foul mood one morning.

Apparently Snape had been a victim of some pretty intense bullying by Sirius Black and his friends, which included Harry's father. Fortunately Harry was more like his mother, and Snape was working to look past his parentage.

The worst thing Sirius had done (or at least attempted to do) was feed Snape to a half-mature _werewolf_ during the full moon. It was only thwarted by James at the last minute, but the damage was done.

Needless to say Snape had a hex-first, curse out later policy whenever Sirius Black was involved.

"How did he take the fact you're on speaking terms with Vincent Greyback?" asked Harry quietly.

"He damn near had a heart attack until Raven told him I had yet to introduce him to you," said Erik, rolling his eyes.

As it was, Remus (when he _finally_ heard the news Sirius was in fact innocent) didn't really paint a pleasant picture of Vincent, even if he generally didn't care about much and had never bitten a single person. He had only beaten Remus up for getting on his nerves, a fact Raven had been quick to point out. He had, after all, given the other werewolf a one-way port key straight back to Britain so he could reconnect with Sirius without robbing him for it.

"Do our ears deceive us?" said George.

"You know the son of Fenrir Greyback, a werewolf that even our Dad says is dangerous?" said Fred.

"Vincent is nothing like his father. Yes, he's naturally feral and embraces his wolf side more than most do, but he's also someone who won't purposely infect another just because they insulted him. He's more likely to just kick their ass than bother with turning someone. And he attends Durmstrang, so you know he's somewhat safe to be around."

"What's Durmstrang?" asked Harry.

"Another magical school. Supposedly either in Bulgaria or the higher reaches of Germany. It's really big on the Dark Arts, according to rumors. There's another one in France called Beauxbatons, but it's mostly for girls and they're really, really strict," said Neville.

"It was also the only school that was willing to take him in, provided he agreed to either take Wolfsbane or leave for three days and play catch up after the full moons. Either way it's pretty expensive, but he apparently paid for a permanent port key that allows him to leave every full moon for a werewolf village and comes back," said Erik.

The port key was cheaper than the potion, since the English refused to sell some of the key ingredients to the Wolfsbane potion. You would think they would _want_ werewolves to take it, since it made things safer for the wizards, but apparently the inborn prejudice towards those cursed made things more difficult than it needed to be.

Besides, he had taken it _once_ and never liked the feeling he got. He was used to being feral, and the only thing the full moon did was give him fur and a new set of fangs and claws that could turn others into creatures like him.

Not that he bothered with that sort of thing, because he wasn't like his 'father'.

Besides, the bitching so wasn't worth turning another person.

Then Erik had a rather evil grin on his face.

"Besides, Vincent can get us prime seats with an up and coming star in Bulgaria."

"Wait..." started George staring at him.

"You mean to tell us your werewolf friend knows..."

"Viktor Krum?!"

"Knows him? They're roommates and good friends. Viktor likes him because he doesn't play up the fact that he's the roommate of a Quidditch star, and Vincent likes Krum because he doesn't treat him like a dog because he's the son of a notorious werewolf. I happen to know for a _fact_ Krum has a habit of using Vincent as a bodyguard to keep the fan girls off him," said Erik smugly.

It was hilarious actually. Viktor got a break from his growing fan girl horde by hanging around a 'dangerous' werewolf, and Vincent had a friend who didn't treat him as an animal. In exchange for keeping the fan girls far from him so he could study in peace, Viktor gave Vincent tickets occasionally, since he had few real friends.

To be fair, Vincent wasn't _that_ impressed that Viktor was 'good at flying on a stick and catching a gold ball'. Hence why they got along famously.

"Ron is going to try and become your new best friend, if he finds out you have an in with Viktor Krum," said George.

"Not happening," said Erik without hesitation.

Luna and Ryoku bounced up to where the boys were. Ryoku was helpful in keeping the bullying to a minimum...but it would only be until Luna finally snapped and delivered a beat down that it would stop.

* * *

"Oh man, did you see that Dullahan's face when you started mocking him?" laughed Harry.

"He shouldn't have mocked a Hogwarts ghost," stated Erik flatly.

"Especially _our_ ghost!" agreed Fred.

Just because Nick wasn't alive didn't mean the lions thought of him as 'just another ghost'. He was _their_ house ghost, so they took the stunt that stupid headless hunt pulled seriously.

Which was why Erik started in on them, bringing up the fact that because Nick still technically had his head, he wouldn't be reminded of the story of the Headless Horseman...who was bested by a squib. That annoyed them pretty quick, because the story of Ichabod Crane (who according to the wizarding version was a squib) was very famous indeed.

According to the 'magical' legend, a dullahan was terrorizing a wizarding village. A squib of a rather prestigous pure blood family called the Cranes, took up his father's sword despite lacking magic and tricked the dullahan into a trap he had set up with his family's magics, despite not being able to use it himself.

It later turned out that Ichabod wasn't a squib, but that he had a different way of channeling his magic... into runes. His family was overjoyed by the fact that the family embarrassment ended up being the family prodigy and brought back their honor.

At least, according to popular theory anyway. Erik was of the opinion some pure blood found the original story and tweaked it to sell more books. It would explain why there were 'magical' versions of the same old fairy tales everyone was familiar with.

Either way it had angered the dullahan...which in turn lead to some embarassment at being bested by one of the living.

Harry was quick to point out they had been invited, and that it was very clear that the Headless Hunt hadn't, otherwise they would have been there earlier. Which made them the party crashers.

The group was heading back to their dorms. Harry, Neville and the twins to Gryffindor, Luna and Ryoku to Ravenclaw, and Erik the solitary Slytherin.

So it was with great surprise that Harry had everyone quiet down because he heard something.

Erik heard something as well. He cupped his hands to his ears to see if he could amplify what he could hear, and that's when he noticed it.

Hissing.

"Does this school use gas pipes or something?"

"Sounds more like someone rather lonely, if you ask me," said Ryoku.

" _Sounds like a snake, though the dialect isn't one I'm familiar with,"_ said Stolas.

"It's said it's going to kill someone!"

Harry raced down the hall, only to stop short at what he saw. Mrs. Norris, the mangy old cat all the students hated, was hanging from one of the staunches that held the torches.

Why they didn't just use witch lights, he would never understand.

Ryoku, who had the best hearing of the group, promptly hissed at them to get out of sight. There was a large group of students heading this way and the last thing they needed was to be found here.

Unfortunately thanks to the king of amateur dramatics (as Erik had quickly called Dumbledore, and the name had stuck) insisted on bringing the fact they were hiding to the rest of the school.

Which was why Erik loudly called him out on the fact. In front of the students.

"Are you an idiot or did you just want to publicly humiliate the same boy everyone believes is your protege for deciding to go to a Death Day Party instead of your tacky little Halloween Feast?"

Everyone was stunned...some out of shock, some out of disbelief, others out of amusement.

"Mr. Lehnscherr!" said McGonagall, thought it was pretty clear Snape sided with him.

"We were staying out of sight because the last thing we wanted was to be suspected of attacking a cat when we were all heading back to our dorms after Nick's party. Just ask the ghosts and they'll confirm we were there, as can the house elves who supplied the food," said Erik flatly.

He was _not_ going to be subject of baseless rumors when he could get the truth out in the open.

"The Slytherin dorms are no where near the second floor," Snape had to point out.

Erik hooked a thumb at the twins.

"I was going to help these two fools in setting up a prank for tomorrow, though it would probably be in bad taste now," said Erik, lying off his ass. Both twins promptly adopted disappointed expressions that he wouldn't help.

Snape snorted.

"Innocent until proven guilty headmaster. We should call the ghosts to confirm their story," said Snape.

McGonagall quickly went to round up Sir Nicholas, who was very happy to sing their praises for chasing the Headless Hunt out of his party...which hadn't ended more than a few minutes before Mrs. Norris had been found.

With a ghost backing up their story, the school rumor mill was kept from believing that they were the culprits.

That still didn't curb the curiosity over who would attack the caretaker's cat, but at least they weren't the prime suspects.

Though now Erik was using Raven to find out what the hell this Chamber of Secrets nonsense was all about...while dealing with the nuisance that was Lockhart.

Erik was half a mind to ask Raven to come in as Defense teacher next year, if only to avoid the headache later.

As it was he was looking for an excuse to get rid of the man.


	11. Chapter 11

It was Christmas, and Harry had been one of a scant few who signed up to stay in the castle.

Next year he was so visiting his new family, even if it meant being nice to the Malfoy family for a night. Aunt Narcissa he could tolerate, but Lucius and Draco were jerks.

Gilderoy Lockhart was a menace, but at least Lucius had explained about the Chamber of Secrets...or what he knew about it.

Since he had thrown Dumbledore's competence as headmaster into question (the headmaster was already on thin ice as the Supreme Mugwump...one more slip up and he would be out) he needed _evidence_ that the man wasn't a good leader for the students.

Harry wouldn't have gone along with it, but Erik had thrown the incident last year into perspective. He had been friends with Charles for years, even teaching a few mutants himself.

The fact Dumbledore told the students to leave the great hall with a dangerous, hard to kill monster on the loose and even dared the more reckless students to all but come face to face with a fully grown three-headed dog was not something a good educator would do. He also had an unhealthy interest in Harry personally... He had tried to use something called 'blood wards' as a reason to keep Harry at his aunt's... only to be shot down by the many pieces of evidence Andromeda insisted on getting from St. Mungo's. She had a qualified Medi-witch who specialized in underage wizards document all the injuries and have a long chat with him...and the evidence was damning.

If it wasn't for Erik being there while they talked, it was unlikely they would have gotten half of the damage out of Harry.

Erik knew exactly what was, and wasn't acceptable in a school full of powered children.

Dumbledore couldn't even compare to his old friend, and he knew he wasn't being biased because Mystique agreed completely with him.

Besides, if Dumbledore wasn't the headmaster, then maybe Snape would be able to take the Defense post like he wanted and someone who could actually _teach_ would take up potions.

Back to Christmas though.

"So any idea what we're going to do for Christmas? I mean it's doubtful the professors would even know what Hanukkah is," said Harry.

"Probably, but I've already showed the house elves how to make some of the more traditional food seeing as how they've been stuck on roughly the same menu since the middle ages," said Erik.

The house elves had been thrilled when Erik gave them easy to understand cook books and they were openly encouraged to try new recipes after seeing how happy it made the students.

It had been many years since he had eaten anything from his childhood that he hadn't made himself.

"How did Sirius take the news?" asked Harry.

"He's unhappy, but understands why you're reluctant to meet him until the therapy is at least halfway done. He did, however, mention that he was going to get you something really, really good for Christmas as a precursor to missing so many."

Sirius mentioned something about a top-of-the-line, not even out yet broom called the Firebolt. It was so good that several Quidditch teams had already preordered a complete set for their players.

Vincent had said something about visiting the French werewolves during his vacation. Though that went hand in hand with visiting the Veela, because the two species had always been somewhat close.

Something about how the Veela worshiped some form of moon goddess and the werewolves were her protectors.

Vincent never really cared for the story, he was just trying to give the werewolves a chance to come back out on top since Voldemort screwed things up for them.

Well that and if the pattern so far held true, then chances were he'd find more mutants at Beauxbatons. Whether or not it would be more of the Brotherhood was debatable.

Raven had some time to kill, and she spoke French better than Sabertooth (or Vincent) ever did, so she agreed to help him out.

Besides, Paris had the best shopping center in Europe.

It was while she was in the magical shopping center (using Vincent as a pack mule because she could) that she saw _them._ Two mutants she knew better than most from the X-Men group.

Rogue and Nightcrawler.

It was clear that neither of them recognized the two on the other side of the shopping center.

Raven discreetly nudged Vincent, then nodded to the two younger mutants.

"Aren't they a sight for old eyes. Think there's more?"

"We've been wondering if Charles will show up...maybe they're a precursor? Either way we should let them know that they're not alone."

"So long as we can dump the bags in your hotel," said Vincent gruffly.

Raven smirked.

Kreacher took the bags, and they went over to the two young mutants.

"Can we help y'all?" asked Rogue, still retaining her Cajun accent. Odds were Nightcrawler had retained his as well.

"That depends...Anna Marie... on whether or not you'll want to hear us out," said Raven.

Rogue and Nightcrawler stiffened.

"Who are you?"

Raven shifted her features into something more familiar, and Vincent did nothing.

"Mystique," said Nightcrawler. Considering the woman before was his mother in his previous life, he had mixed feelings on seeing her here.

"And Sabertooth. Magneto is now a twelve-year-old in Hogwarts," said Raven smirking.

Rogue choked.

"He's a what now?"

"A snot-nosed twelve-year-old orphan who seems bent on making Albus Dumbledore's life a living hell. And who's currently corrupting the one the English call the 'Boy-who-lived' as his little brother," said Raven smirking.

"...Got any pictures?"

Raven pulled out her wallet and brought out a Christmas photo...a magical one, so the sight of him rotating those meditation balls Harry got him were clearly seen.

Rogue wasn't the only one who laughed. Kurt did too.

"He looks so cute!" said Rogue.

"I know right? Hard to believe the anti-human Magneto could be that adorable. Of course now his goal is to see that there is _actual_ equality among the magicals, not this fake one that Dumbledore promotes."

"I thought Magneto hated humans?" asked Nightcrawler.

"No, he hates the fact that a portion of humanity wants to kill mutants simply for existing and having powers. If he can get the magicals to at least drop that blood purity nonsense, then he would be willing to adopt a live and let live policy...unless they start targeting us again. Then he'll become nasty," said Raven.

"Huh... I could live with that. But I ain't going after normal humans just because they're not like us," said Rogue.

"Likewise," said Nightcrawler.

"And he won't ask you to. All he wants is for you to stand up and fight to establish real order. At most he'll use you to recruit others," said Raven.

"Recruitin' is all I've _been_ doing since he showed up," said Vincent irritably.

"Recruiting who?"

"Werewolves. My 'father' is Fenrir Greyback, but I'd rather side with Magneto than that weakling Voldemort," said Vincent gruffly.

Both Rogue and Nightcrawler had heard of Fenrir Greyback...and Voldemort. They had also heard of the casualty list for the 'Light' side...which, strangely enough, outnumbered that of the 'Dark' side which Voldemort lead.

Even Professor Xavier was better at leading his people into battle.

"So our only choices, if this battle restarts, are either the senile old man who doesn't know how to fight a war properly, a man who believes only the old bloodlines should live, and someone who used to be our enemy?" said Rogue.

"From what I heard after Dumbledore killed Grindlewald he was so horrified from murdering his lover than he became obsessed with the 'greater good' theory," said Raven.

Rogue and Nightcrawler made a face.

People who believed in that greater good bullshit tended to not think twice about sacrificing their own men just to satisfy their attempts to redeem themselves for some past sin.

In this case, Dumbledore's conscience about killing his former lover.

"I'll take my chances with the deranged mind of Magneto," said Rogue, making a face.

"So, any idea how you ended up here?"

"Woke up one day, realized I was five again, and had no idea how I ended up in a place I didn't recognize," said Rogue.

"Same here, only it happened at seven," said Kurt.

"Remembered who I was after my 'father' bit me to insure I would get the curse," said Vincent gruffly.

"I came back the day my gift came back...and ironically my twin sister has it as well, only hers doesn't cover animals," said Raven.

"So which family were you born to?" asked Rogue, honestly curious.

"You're looking at the head of the Black family," said Raven smugly, enjoying their shock.

"As in Sirius Black?"

"Who did you think got him a trial and then forced that idiot Fudge and the old goat Dumbledore to pay up for leaving him in that hell hole? Santa?"

Raven left her phone number and contact information, while Vincent went to get ready. They still had to make it to the werewolf packs before nightfall, if they wanted to avoid dealing with a bunch of transformed werewolves. While Mystique could change her scent so they wouldn't attack her, it was still a headache they would like to avoid.

Especially since Vincent rarely played well with others of his own kind.

* * *

Erik read the owl with a strange expression on his face. It was almost...happy? Yet at the same time it was disappointed.

Raven was the first of the mutants to reawaken as her real self in this world. Vincent was next, followed by Rogue and Kurt. The last one, who knew from the start who and what he was, happened to be Erik.

So were they the only ones? Now he knew that it wasn't only the Brotherhood's top agents that had come here, but some of the X-Men as well (both with close connection to Mystique, whether they acknowledged it or not), he had to wonder if others of _their_ kind had slipped through.

Had Charles?

No matter what arguments or disputes they might have had, Erik missed his old friend. They were close because they still had hope that the other would see things their way, but mostly because Charles was a nosy old fool. It would be nice to see him again...but if not then that was acceptable too.

Charles might have agreed with Dumbledore's philosophy, or have been fooled by it if he had been here.

Erik paused.

No. Charles was many things, but he wasn't a fool like Dumbledore. He might have tried to work with the man, but Dumbledore's hypocrisy would drive him away almost as surely as Voldemort's lies would.

"So you found more of your friends then?" asked Harry.

"Two more in France. I'm beginning to see a conspiracy or something."

Actually it was less of a conspiracy and more of a suspicion. Because the last memory he had was of something hitting him in a place that should have hurt, but he only felt relief. Something that bypassed his automatic defense against all metals, possibly plastic or some other cheaply manufactured thing.

He would have to speak to Raven and the others to confirm, but if he was right then it lead to a grim sign.

That they hadn't just been randomly chosen and reborn in this new world...but that they had all been selected for one reason or another after being _killed_.

Which really begged the question, why him? After all the evil things he had done, all the sins on his soul, why did he deserve a second chance at being reborn? Even Mystique and Sabertooth had a laundry list of sins that would make dying and going to heaven a laughable concept.

Kurt and Rogue, he could understand them getting a second chance. But why three of the worst mutants in the Brotherhood?

Erik sighed. He had to put back this mystery for another time...perhaps it was just a coincidence his last memory was something striking him in a place he knew to be fatal. It might even explain why he woke up as an eleven year old and not an infant like Raven had.

He tensed up slightly when he felt something warm and gentle. It took him a few seconds to process that Harry was hugging him.

"What are you doing?"

"You looked depressed, and I think this is what you do to cheer people up," said Harry honestly.

The realization hit Erik like a thunderbolt. And he just knew Raven would laugh at him for taking so long to figure it out.

Yes, he had targeted Harry initially because he could spot an abused child a mile away and felt the boy could be useful. But he hadn't taken into account the attachment that often came with it.

And without the other members of the Brotherhood to buffer his interaction with the children, it was only natural he would become fond of the boy.

Dammit...now he knew Raven would laugh at him for viewing Harry as a little brother, if only because of how long it took for him to realize it. And he was too invested in fixing what that senile old man had tried to break to push him away.

Well, if he was going to treat Harry like family then he was going all in. Even if it meant he was going to be a little overprotective until he got used to having something close to a family again.

After all, by the time he realized he had children still alive, it had been too late for him to establish an emotional connection to them.


	12. Chapter 12

_**I'm sure many of you are wondering why I chose the name**_ **Adamantium _for a story like this. The honest answer is that it was the first thing that came to mind. Some authors have trouble with the summary. Some have trouble with the title. I have trouble with both sometimes. So when I find a title that seems to fit, I use it._**

 **Adamantiu _m is a strictly Marvel-based metal, and this story is mostly about how Marvel-verse is intruding on HP-verse. The reason why the sequel will be called_ Mithril _is because that is a well-known magical metal. Mitrhil will be Harry going into the Marvel-verse to cause trouble._**

 ** _Hope that explains why it's called Adamantium to you, and I know some of you have been asking about that!_**

* * *

Erik's eyebrows twitched. It was understandable really, considering what he had gotten in the pile of gifts.

In his hands was an almost perfect replica of his helmet, down to the colors. In the box it came in there was even an decent recreation of his costume, spelled to fit his current size.

The box said Raven, but he had the feeling Harry was behind this.

He confirmed that when he found the note inside the cape.

 _'You seemed to have a fascination with Magneto for some reason, so I asked Raven to help me get this for you. She sounded very amused for some reason._

 _The helmet is charmed to keep out legilmens, among other things. The costume was charmed to have climate control spells, protection spells (up to anything save dragonfire, according to the specialist), and can block low-level jinxes, curses and hexes with no trouble. I think Raven also made it bulletproof, but you'd have to ask her._

 _Happy Hanukkah,_

 _Harry.'_

Erik found a second note from Raven, and he knew she was laughing her ass off at him.

 _'Harry still has no idea, but this was too amusing to pass up. I even sent one to Vincent with his old costume, though I'm sure it will take a while before he figures that out considering I laced it with lavender (werewolves are sensitive to that scent)._

 _The costume is spelled heavily enough to protect you from anything a normal Hogwarts student would face, and I had it the armor custom made so it provides more protection than your last one did. I tried to get the helmet right, but you'll have to test it out to see if the dwarves got the metal ratio correct. They were pretty shocked that I came to them rather than get the cheap stuff from the goblins._

 _Raven._

 _P.S. Yes I am laughing at you for taking so long to figure out that Harry was going to be more than just another minion to you...and the fact he picked up on your 'obsession'.'_

Though it was the letter from Vincent that had him snort and send back an almost instant reply.

" _Boss, tell that damn shape shifter to quit pranking me. My roommate wouldn't stop laughing for ten full minutes when he found out lavender oil makes me sneeze!"_

Erik's reply?

 _'What are you, seven? If she pranks you, prank her back. You two know each other well enough that you can get her with_ something _.'_

Most amusing Hanukkah and Christmas he'd had in a while.

* * *

Harry was grinning at Erik when he realized that his friend/brother had gotten the costume...but wasn't wearing it for obvious reasons.

Harry fully planned to drag Erik to a comic convention where Stan Lee was scheduled to appear and win the best costume prize.

He had no idea Erik fully planned to try and strangle Stan Lee for _making_ the X-Men series, or that he wasn't amused in the least that he was considered a villain.

Even if he was ranked the number 1 villain out of hundreds of other comic book villains.

The only question Harry had was which costume to wear. Raven had the perfect costume for him...and a potential girlfriend. Now he just needed to learn French.

For the most part Christmas was rather entertaining. Draco got hit with a holiday prank that gave him reindeer antlers. The Weasley twins were shocked to find they were being outclassed by a pair of second years all because they had bribed Moaning Myrtle to haunt the Gryffindor tower...she had gotten busted after the Dueling Club fiasco by McGonagall...and best of all was the constipated look on Dumbledore's face.

Lucius was putting the pressure on the old wizard and was very close to kicking him out.

Dumbledore _might_ have been a good leader ONCE, but that was ruined after he was so horrified at having killed his former lover that he was an ineffectual leader at best.

For one thing, he was so used to sitting on the benches that he refused any real progress to be made and even compromised the safety of the students just because he was afraid of the Ministry getting in and realizing he wasn't as good as he used to be.

In the words of Erik when Lucius asked him to spy on the old goat, someone needed to call him on the bullshit he spewed, since he was practically wallowing in it. It was so bad that he kept _anything_ useful from being done.

As long as it meant removing the 'muggle lover' from power, Lucius would help Erik anyway he could.

* * *

"Okay, any chance of me having a good opinion of this moron just went out the window," said Erik, eyes twitching. He felt sorry for the dwarves, he really did.

On the plus side this did give him a chance to make a contact with the dwarvish race about kicking the goblins out of the tunnels and a chance to really, really piss them off.

Erik went to talk to the dwarves, who went from surly, to surprised, to evil smirks.

One of them, clearly the leader of the group, went to talk business while they others pretended to sing valentines when in reality they were cursing out Lockhart and the goblin tribes both.

Everyone was relieved when the 'singing cupids' were gone, but only one student had come out with a chance to make a valuable ally.

* * *

Harry sat his bag next to Erik. For the past few months he had been hearing voices in the walls... a voice that Stolas and Ryoku claimed was a massive snake.

Frankly Erik had enough of this Heir of Slytherin crap. So when Harry heard the voice again, Erik followed him and told him to get a rough estimate of where the thing was.

Within ten minutes he had isolated the serpent...which had been traveling in the pipes for some reason...inside the wall itself.

He just constricted the pipes a little ahead of where the thing would be, and once Harry told him he could hear it curse at the block, he constricted it again at the other end. He left enough room to breath, but not enough that the thing could get out.

Now to figure out what to do with, if he was judging this right, an almost eighty foot snake. It seemed a waste to just kill it, and they still had no clue as to what it was doing in the school.

Which was when Harry offered a suggestion.

"Why can't we send it to Count D? Maybe he could find a better home for it."

"You do realize that for a snake this size it's likely to be an old basilisk, right? The only way we'd be able to get the snake out is to literally rip the pipes out of the wall, which means they'd have to find a way to repair them."

"You could always get Malfoy Sr. to use this as an excuse to upgrade the castle, or at least bring more classes into it."

Erik opened his mouth to say something, but then an idea occurred to him.

"It would get Draco to quit hogging all the hot water for a while..." he mused.

"See? All kinds of perks!"

"Yes, but there's still the issue of the Acromantula colony in the forest. They might use this as an excuse to attack the castle."

"Can't you ask the centaurs to keep them at bay?"

"Or I can do the smart thing and thin the ranks...with a little help. It'll have to be over the summer though."

Harry twitched.

"Speaking of summer..."

Erik turned to look at him.

"Something weird has been going on since we had those classes on Occulemency with Professor Snape."

"Weird how?"

"Um... Are you really Magneto?"

Erik blinked.

"What makes you ask that?"

"Well I keep getting these weird flashes and voices in my head. Almost like I can read minds or something. And last week after this massive migraine because of the Heir of Slytherin nonsense I sent a vase crashing into the wall...only I didn't touch it or have my wand on it."

Erik paused, then an idea came to him.

"Okay we're going to test this out. Let's find a classroom we can use. If I'm right then we can work with this."

Erik had Harry sitting in a chair inside the 'Come and Go Room', according to the house elves. All around them were easily breakable vases.

"First we're going to see if this is what I believe it is. Try to focus on my mind and my mind only."

Harry kept his eyes firmly on Erik. Legilmency, as Snape had told them, used the eyes as a medium but didn't necessarily need them. It just made things easier.

Eyes were the windows to the soul and all that.

"I can't hear anything."

Erik sighed, before bringing to the forefront one of his older memories. Or the ones he had when he was listening to the same nonsense under a different name.

"Try to focus. What exactly am I remembering? You _should_ be able to at least see or hear parts of it, if I'm right."

Harry closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His face scrunched up in confusion.

"There's two old men. One of them is in a wheelchair. He seems to be looking for something."

"What does the one in the wheelchair look like?"

"He's old. Almost like Dumbledore but more along the lines of McGonagall. And he's bald. He..."

"He what?"

"He looks like a Captain from one of the old _Star Trek_ series," admitted Harry. Which was weird.

Erik snorted.

"What's his name?"

"Charles, I think. What's going on?"

"You, from what I can tell, are a psychic. What you saw were one of my memories...and yes, Charles did look like a Captain from _Star Trek."_

Raven had been beyond gleeful at the fact she kept finding their doubles in popular movies and series. She couldn't wait to introduce Erik to _Lord of the Rings_. She had laughed herself sick when she happened to be watching _Star Trek_ and immediately recognized one of the actors.

Her sister thought she had finally lost it.

"Wait, you mean like Jean Grey from _X-Men_?"

Erik leaned against one of the tables.

"Remember how you asked me if I was Magneto?" he asked quietly. Harry nodded. It was the name that kept repeating in some of the flashes he got.

Erik lifted his hand, and one of the tables (which happened to be steel for some reason, considering all the others were wood) flew to his hand, stopping mere inches from impact.

Harry watched with mouth wide open in disbelief as the steel flattened and became something like a shield, then contorted into many different shapes.

"No way. You mean to tell me you're really...?"

"A comic book super villain? If I ever find this Stan Lee I'll be sure to give him a piece of my mind," said Erik darkly.

"From what I read about the character, Magneto wasn't always supposed to be a villain. He was based more on people like Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., but his methods were the reason why people call him 'evil'," said Harry, having looked him up on Wikipedia.

Raven had a working laptop in the house, and Harry had been fascinated by the X-Men books so he looked up the characters.

"So is Raven...?"

"Raven is Mystique, the werewolf named Vincent is Sabertooth, and they recently came across Rogue and Nightcrawler."

"Wasn't Nightcrawler Mystique's son?" asked Harry, cocking his head.

"Yes. And Rogue is as close to as her adopted daughter as she's likely to get," said Erik patiently.

"So cool! So what now?"

"Now we confirm you have a psychic ability or if it's just legilmency. Try to call one of these vases to you, but don't use your wand. When I went to check on my mutation, I felt something curling around it like a cat. I'm assuming that it's my magic."

Harry closed his eyes and concentrated.

He could feel _something_ warm in his body, but he didn't know about the cat thing. When poked at it, it felt bubbly and happy. Then he noticed something else. A small ball inside the warm energy that seemed to be growing. He touched it, and he could _hear_ everything in the castle, from the house elves to the teachers. Snape and Dumbledore had a mental barrier around them, so he left them alone.

Then he remembered what Erik told him so he concentrated on calling the vases to him...only to hear a lot of shattering against something hard.

Opening his eyes he realized Erik had surrounded him behind a metal barrier and all around them were the shattered vases after impacting on the metal dome.

Lowering it, Erik looked at him.

"I felt something. Like a ball of energy I couldn't explain, but when I touched it I could hear _everything_ in the castle...except Snape and Dumbledore."

"Well the good news is that I know roughly how to train psychics. The bad news, if you want to look at it that way, is that you are a mutant the same as Mystique and myself. So people might not appreciate it," said Erik.

"Why would it be a bad thing? Aren't mutations a gift?"

Erik paused, then looked at Harry.

"Explain your reasoning."

"Well Raven's mutation allows her to shapeshift into practically any form right? Which is similar enough to be mistaken for a metamorph. I would think that the magical community would be eager to add such 'gifts' to their bloodlines, thinking it was a magical one. They wouldn't know the difference between a mutation and a magically inherited talent," explained Harry.

"And there is rarely a case where a child born to a mutant wouldn't later become one...or at the very least would have a child that would pass on the gene to their descendants leading to new mutations."

Erik was astounded. All this time he had fought for equality between humans and mutants, and here was a solution staring him in the face.

"So if I'm a mutant does that mean I get to wear a costume like you do?" asked Harry.

"Actually Raven and I were thinking of making a modified version of Gambit's costume, considering we found Rogue."

Harry's grin was wide. Gambit was awesome, but he liked Deadpool better. Who wouldn't love that much insanity?


	13. Chapter 13

Tom Riddle, currently hiding in the body of Ginny Weasley through a diary, was frustrated and very confused. From what he could tell the basilisk he had set loose was still out and about in the castle, but after the last attack he had yet to see it again. He knew it wasn't dead, because he would have heard if the Professors had found and killed it, or even realized what it was.

Instead it looked like it had gone out and never come back to the Chamber, which was odd. And there was no way he could try and locate it without getting caught.

Which meant he would have to find a new way to rid the school of muggleborns...or hope to stumble across the basilisk.

Dumbledore had an uncomfortable look on his face as he announced to the school...

"Students, due to a recent pipe burst the second floor has been deemed unsafe for you to use until the mess is cleaned up and the pipes fixed. Also, because of all the recent incidents with the pipes malfunctioning the water charm is now considered a mandatory spell for all years and the teachers will be showing you how to adjust it appropriately. Another note is that one of the lesser known charms called the 'chamberpot' spell will be taught to all years until the pipes are fixed," said Dumbledore.

Erik had to raise his hand.

"When you say chamberpot you don't honestly mean the same thing they used in the middle ages in place of the toilet do you?" he asked slowly.

Judging by his expression, it was exactly that. Erik wasn't the only one with a disgusted face.

Most of the girls were horrified...so was Lockhart for similar reasons.

All this because he had to rip out a large section of pipe with a basilisk stuck inside it and deliver it to Count D. Though the look on Dumbledore's face when he had to explain why the second floor was now off limits was pretty funny.

"I am not using a chamberpot to use the bathroom," stated Harry flatly.

"Yes, well, neither are we," said the twins, sidling up to Erik and Harry.

"What would you say to a potentially profitable endeavor in which we don't have to squat over something to take a piss?" asked Fred.

"We're listening."

"Here's the thing."

"We may..."

"Or may not..."

"Have a map that would lead us straight to Hogsmeade."

"Wait, Hogsmeade as in the village outside the castle? That Hogsmeade?" said Harry, already getting an idea of where this was going.

The twins nodded.

"You want us to help set up a distraction so students can slip out of the castle and borrow the bathrooms in the village."

"More than that...we could charge for the use of said distractions," said Erik, catching on himself. He could care less about the idea of popping a squat in the woods. He knew how to survive in the wilds were toilets weren't exactly going to be common.

The twin's eyes gleamed at the thought of profit.

"Here's what we'll do..." started Harry, and the group leaned in.

* * *

It was an underground system of students. While the teachers made do with their own way of disposing their waste, the students quickly learned to make use of the (surprisingly many) abandoned homes in Hogsmeade. When Harry explained what was going on to the residents of the village, they were more than sympathetic to the problem and agreed not to mention that the students were out in the village outside the scheduled weekends. At least until the plumbing was fixed in the castle anyway.

The twins didn't mind the extra detentions, because they were getting quite a bit of gold selling distractions for the students to use to keep Filch and the other teachers busy.

Meanwhile Harry and Erik were the ones selling 'passes' for students entering the village...and keeping said exits hidden with a spell on the 'pass' that would obliviate the knowledge of _where_ the exit was located.

Needless to say when the issue was resolved, the twins had made more galleons in that month alone than they had selling their pranks before. They were now very close to their goal of owning and operating a prank shop to rival Zonko's.

* * *

"I am going to kill Lockhart," said Erik.

"Yes, but the question is will you leave enough for Snape to have a piece of the idiot too?"

"Of course I will. He needs something to vent on, after all," said Erik, as if he was astounded Harry would think otherwise.

"So...practice later?"

"Only if you don't mind doing something you might consider boring."

Harry was about to answer him, but then he stopped and stared.

"Isn't that Ginny Weasley?"

"It is. Why is she carrying an old book like that?" said Erik, frowning.

He wasn't psychic or magically sensitive, but the book gave him some really bad vibes.

So the two followed her into Moaning Myrtle's bathroom where she threw the thing into a toilet.

Harry did the smart thing and stunned her, while Erik confiscated the book. His mental defenses were higher than most of the castle, partially because of his experience with mental intrusion (thank you Charles) but mostly because he had been upgrading his occulmency barriers left and right every chance he could. And with decades of experience that meant his barriers were pretty strong...and extremely nasty.

Though they weren't anywhere near as devious as Raven's barriers, which was a monster that would shapeshift into something even more worse every time it even _looked_ like someone was getting past her defenses.

Her mental barriers went from dangerous to absolute lethal in less than a minute, and it only got worse the longer you were in her head.

Madam Pomphrey, when she did an in-depth scan of the girl, frowned. Then she did another scan which gave her similar results...and a third to confirm that. She ushered the boys out of the hospital wing, where she secluded Ginny Weasley from the public part of the wing before calling St. Mungo's for additional help.

Erik took possession of the book, seeing as how he could feel the thing trying to latch onto his mental defenses. Whatever this thing was, it was _nasty_.

If Madam Pomphrey had been alarmed, it was nothing compared to how _Snape_ reacted once he realized what he had in his hands. Whatever the book was, it was a very Darke artifact if the expression on his face was anything to go by.

Erik made no mention of who had it, but he did comment that the monster inside the Chamber had been appropriately dealt with... even if the pipes had to suffer a minor accident as a result.

Dumbledore didn't need to know that the basilisk that once lived in the Chamber was now in the tender mercies of the infamous Count D, or that it was being given treatment for malnourishment and brainwashing.

Count D had high hopes he could rehabilitate the serpent and hopefully return it to the school as the guardian it was originally intended...or to find it an owner that could treat it with the dignity it deserved.

It was extremely rare to find a fully _intact_ basilisk this old that hadn't been deliberately blinded. Either way it wasn't attacking the students anymore and Erik had thoughtfully shared the memory of Dumbledore's expression explaining why the pipes were out of commission for nearly two months while they inspected them.

"So what exactly is it? I felt the thing trying to test my barriers all the way here," asked Erik.

"I have no idea, but the amount of dark magic pouring out of it makes it an imminent threat to the students. Fortunately I have contacts in the Department of Mysteries who would be more than happy to investigate this and keep it from Dumbledore," said Snape.

"A pity we can't twist Ginny's sudden seclusion in the hospital wing as a reason to get Dumbledore thrown out," said Erik.

Snape paused, an idea already forming.

* * *

Erik overheard a rather shocking rumor that the Heir of Slytherin had attacked Ginny Weasley, a known Pure Blood witch, directly causing her to be put into an isolated room in the hospital wing.

The fact Madam Pomphrey refused to comment or let anyone know why she was in there for more than a few hours only fueled this rumor. Especially since several students had seen members of St. Mungo's in the hospital wing as well.

Meanwhile Snape used the uproar as a chance to deliver the book to the Unspeakable, who took it and said nothing. However no mention of it was made to anyone who was a known Dumbledore supporter, meaning he wouldn't be aware of it until after it was successfully destroyed.

Lucius was more than pleased over the rumors. Because less than a week after Ginny was sent to St. Mungo's for a few days observation, Dumbledore was promptly kicked out of the Wizangamot and his title as Supreme Mugwump removed. His titles as Headmaster were also thrown into question, because he had allowed this monster to attack a _pure blood_ child on his watch, and it had been serious enough that she was in the magical hospital and not under Poppy's care.

Even Augusta Longbottom, Neville's terrifying grandmother, couldn't dispute that this had gone on long enough. And with the safety of the pure bloods in question, very, very few supported Dumbledore.

By March, Dumbledore was suspended as Headmaster pending investigation. McGonagall would have been placed as Interim Headmistress, but her protests over the suspension and the fact she was a known die hard supporter of Dumbledore's decisions (thus she could be directly influenced by the man) meant they had to pass her over.

Snape was now the interim headmaster until this mess was sorted out. Partly because Lucius was all for a _Slytherin_ headmaster, but mostly because he was one of the few teachers who still argued with Dumbledore and wouldn't blindly follow his orders like McGonagall.

Needless to say the Slytherins were pretty pleased by this turn of events. Even if they were still regarded with suspicion as long as the chamber was considered open.

Erik's plans to get Dumbledore out of the castle legally were working. Now he had to _keep_ him out.

Snape had no intention of teaching potions while he sorted out the mess Dumbledore had left...so he hired a 'temporary' teacher who was more than happy to take his place while he sorted out the paperwork.

If things went right, the teacher would become permanent and he would either teach Defense...or he would be the new Headmaster. He found it much easier to deal with the students when he didn't have to teach them his favorite subject, and they found him easier to be around since they no longer had to stay in his presence unless they were in trouble.

Erik already had a plan to make Snape look better than Dumbledore. One even the more die hard Light supporters couldn't exactly complain about.

With the attacks stopped, Erik sent an anonymous letter to the _Daily Prophet_ about the 'receipt' Count D had given him as 'proof of delivery' of a thousand year old basilisk from Hogwarts grounds...and a large section of pipe.

Considering the people of Hogsmeade had let it slip that Hogwarts had been having plumbing issues for months now, most figured out that the removal of the 'monster' in the Chamber of Secrets had required the students to sacrifice regular plumbing.

Erik casually mentioned that Snape had shown him a charm that could bend the pipes, thus allowing him to 'trap' the serpent safely with Harry's help. He refused to mention which one it was, for fear that the Weasley twins would over use it and cause another pipe break.

Since he was the start of this mess, and freed Snape from a post he hated, the hopefully _former_ Potions teacher brought the rather intelligent Slytherin in for some more ideas. Erik promptly brought Harry in for some creative thinking, and Neville for a good idea on how the pure bloods would react.

Snape's idea to bring Erik in for some ideas worked out better than he could have hoped. At this rate he might actually become headmaster and say goodbye to dealing with snot nosed children on a daily basis...not to mention waking up early which he loathed to begin with. The only issue he had was keeping Dumbledore _out_ of the school and away from the post of Headmaster.

Erik knew the best way to keep Dumbledore out was to get the court of public opinion in his favor. The odds were stacked against him, but if they could keep the old wizard away from Hogwarts until the middle of the next school year they might have a shot.

The first thing Snape did as temporary Headmaster was authorize something that was long overdue... replacing every broom in the school, whether it was magical or mundane. Those owned by the students were inspected by professionals, but the ones used by the school were sent off to be made into kindling. Madam Hooch was given more than enough funds to buy all new ones for the next school year... a topic she had complained about for years since the old ones started to malfunction, but Dumbledore refused to do anything about until he had no other choice.

Snape made it clear to the school governors that he wouldn't be above asking for donations if Dumbledore's claims that they "didn't have the funds to replace the brooms" used to teach flying lessons were true. They weren't, something that annoyed Hooch greatly when she found out. Filch was just glad to have brooms he could actually use now.

The second thing Snape did (one of Harry's suggestions) was to hire a second highly qualified Medi-wizard to help Poppy out in the event of a crisis. The man came with numerous recommendations and had specialized in underage magical children at St. Mungo's...which meant that the boys would have someone they could confide personal information to that they wouldn't to a witch.

It also freed her up to deal with the petrified victims while he dealt with the daily injuries that came with a magical school.

But one of the major changes he did was have the Slytherins work with the Ravenclaws during the more volatile classes like Charms, Transfiguration and Potions, while the Gryffindors were paired with the Hufflepuffs.

The number of 'accidents' during class dropped by sixty-five percent in the first week. Especially potions, since Draco could no longer antagonize the Gryffindors.

Little by little, Snape was improving his image over the dour bat in the dungeons that the students regarded him as. The fact they no longer had to deal with him directly on a weekly basis helped a lot too.

But it was Neville's idea that Snape enjoyed the best...because it would quickly become the preferred punishment for anyone who earned his ire...and it was supported by Sprout to boot.

They made a new greenhouse, one which would be maintained through strictly muggle methods and all wands outside of the teachers would be confiscated before entering.

Students caught breaking the rules (or bullying) would be sent to the new greenhouse where they would cultivate the most labor-intensive (yet hard to kill) plants in the muggle world to see if they could be used for potions. There they would spend a certain amount of hours weeding, fertilizing, watering or putting in seeds the muggle way.

As Harry could attest, having spent countless hours doing just that for his aunt's garden, it was thankless back-breaking work that would leave you bone tired at the end of it.

A large number of teachers supported the idea, to Snape's surprise.

Filch, Sprout, Flitwick, Hagrid and shockingly enough McGonagall agreed it was a good idea. Then again, it was a harmless way to punish students.


	14. Chapter 14

**Yes, Harry has a mutation. No, it's not just a psychic ability. Harry's mutation is more like Rogue's ability to 'drain' mutant gifts, except unlike Rogue he has to be subjected to them first and the power-level of the ability is determined by the amount of exposure he has to it. I've officially dubbed his ability "Copy Cat", and have already determined his mutant codename.**

 **The basic gist of his power is that if he's exposed to a mutation, say Wolverine's healing ability, then he has the ability to 'copy' it much like Rogue does, except it's a permanent addition. However if a mutant has more than one ability, then he gets the mutation most compatible with him. The more he's exposed to that mutation, the stronger his version of it becomes. Ironically this also makes him immune to Rogue's mutation. And yes, I am so shipping Rogue/Harry in this story. He has no control over what he gets, so it's usually a toss-up of what he absorbs.**

 **Hope this makes you anticipate chapter fifteen more, because another Mutant makes an appearance and gives Erik a migraine.**

* * *

Snape's tenure as Headmaster seemed to be going better than he could have ever hoped. The students no longer mocked him behind his back, the teachers were forced to listen to him, and he didn't have to deal with the annoyance of seeing brats ruin potions every week.

Dumbledore was having a slightly less pleasant time of it.

After Snape was elected as temporary headmaster (pending investigation of Dumbledore) he found himself on the wrong end of some very accusing gazes from people who had never taken his word as law.

People like Madam Longbottom and Amelia Bones.

Snape not only made changes that Dumbledore had refused to year after year, but he openly invited the ward masters from the Ministry to come in and inspect the ones in Hogwarts.

They came out appalled at how badly they had deteriorated, as Dumbledore clearly hadn't bothered to inspect them on the date set aside for just such a purpose.

There was now a plan set in motion to fully revamp the wards or update them so that the school was much more secure during the summer.

Another shock was the discovery of the large acromantula colony in the forest, which was the main reason why it was considered too dangerous for the students to enter.

A mass extermination was planned while the wards were being updated, to eliminate the threat to the student since the basilisk no longer kept the beasts from entering the castle.

Apparently the beast had been providing a passive defense...at least until someone forced it to attack students.

Dumbledore found it rather disconcerting that Snape's star was now on a rapid rise...though it was very obvious he wasn't the brains behind most of the changes to the school.

No, he was more of a willing puppet to the second year Slytherin Erik Lehnscherr. He was the force behind this mess, but the problem was he had no real way to prove it.

Lockhart had been thrown out of the castle bodily by a rather angry Hagrid. He had been caught with a sixth-year girl, who was clearly under the influence of a nasty potion, by the ill-timed arrival of Hermione Granger. She had fled to McGonagall before he could stop her, and she reported it immediately to Snape, despite her dislike of the man.

Snape had no tolerance for Lockhart, and frankly neither did any of the other teachers. Hagrid had been more than happy to give him the boot, seeing as how he had the strength for it.

Lockhart's quarters were promptly inspected, and upon the discovery of his diary the man was immediately arrested for the use of several illegal potions on underage witches, most of which ranged from fifth to seventh year. And that was before word got out that the man had _stolen_ the accomplishments of other wizards before obliviating them.

Fortunately it was only a few months before the exams, which Snape planned to cancel anyway. Well, everything barring the OWLs and NEWTs at least. He didn't control those, but the fifth and seventh years would be given some leeway considering how the school year had gone.

It was another planned maneuver by Lehnscherr to sway the student body towards Snape as Headmaster and not Dumbledore.

Lucius was more than happy to insure that the investigation would take it's sweet time before they bothered to actually release the results publicly. Giving Lehnscherr more opportunity to find incriminating evidence against Dumbledore.

Snape sat at the Headmaster's chair, enjoying some sweet revenge against the old cat who should have taken Dumbledore's place had things gone normally.

Lehnscherr was definitely the embodiment of a true Slytherin. Even Draco had conceded that fact once they realized there was a chance Snape might take the spot officially and not just replace the old goat.

It wasn't a very high chance, but it was still there.

The way Lehnscherr maneuvered him into that position was flawless, and done in a way that Dumbledore's own supporters couldn't really dispute. He would have to do things the hard way if he wanted his post back and that was if public opinion agreed with him.

His control over the house of snakes was now complete.

* * *

Sirius Black couldn't believe what he was hearing.

"Snape as headmaster?"

"To be fair, it was either we put him in the spot or allow one of Dumbledore's sycophants take over and nothing would change. Which is why we're planning another trick to get more of _our_ supporters into positions of power," said Erik.

This was actually their second meeting, as he wanted to breach the waters with Black so he knew exactly who he would be dealing with. While he found it amusing to be answering to a soon-to-be 13-year old wizard, that amusement was tempered by the fact that it was blatantly obvious that the boy would go far.

Like a chess master slowly taking his opponent's power base down one by one, Erik was removing Dumbledore's support from under him...and at the same time limiting Voldemort's pool of willing minions.

Raven and Narcissa were currently looking into a way to remove the Dark Mark, as Lucius had been suitably angered learning Voldemort was in fact the bastard son of a squib and a muggle. One who had no legitimate claim on the "Slytherin" name as they had been told.

This was from the diary Erik had confiscated and Snape had passed on to the Unspeakables...who had interrogated the portion of Voldemort's sixteen-year-old self for days before throwing it into a veil which killed the fragment once it made contact.

Needless to say the pure blood faction that followed Lucius were very displeased when they heard the truth, and were more than willing to follow Lehnscherr's banner if it meant not having to deal with two liars.

Erik might have offered the DADA post to Sirius, but there were several factors against him.

One, he had nearly killed Snape and was an absolute bastard when they were students. Meaning Snape would be rather antagonistic towards him for good reasons. Two, he still wasn't cleared by Raven to come fifty feet near Harry, and hadn't completed his mandatory therapy.

But the main reason was that he already had an idea of who to hire that would be acceptable for most and keep Snape's star on the rise.

Remus had been considered, but because he was a werewolf it was too dangerous to chance it, and Snape still hadn't forgiven him for almost biting him all those years ago. Not to mention he was a die hard Dumbledore supporter, which they were trying to get rid of.

So he thought outside the box and helped Snape contact a foreign wizard to teach Defense. One that was not only competent, but had gotten several recommendations from other schools where he had given some rather detailed lectures on both magical creatures and dark magics.

He was also not a fan of Dumbledore or the Dark Lord.

The only issue was who to hire to teach History, if only so students wouldn't automatically fall asleep during the class.

The twins offered the use of Bill, their older brother, seeing as how as a curse breaker he had an intimate look at history up close and personal.

And it would give Erik a chance to break yet another Weasley out of the hopefully soon-to-be-former headmaster's grip.

"Still, Snape as headmaster..." grimaced Sirius.

"Which is why I want you to try and broach out to the families that don't automatically believe Dumbledore is Merlin, but also sided firmly against Riddle. The neutrals. It'll give you something to do and you'll actually be useful instead of doing nothing."

"What do you want me to promote?" asked Sirius. Lenscherr might be a Snake, but so long as he treated Harry like a little brother he would at least listen. Besides, it wasn't any different than what he had Fenrir's son doing and was actually useful later.

"How about a magical society where changes actually have a chance of happening and where the Wizangamot isn't constantly stalled by Dumbledore's dallying or Voldemort's bullshit?" said Erik flatly.

The magical society had stagnated, and Dumbledore wasn't helping things progress one bit. It was something that annoyed Erik greatly.

"Heh. I'd agree to something like that."

"And I know the perfect way to try and get the Longbottoms on our side, if Madam Longbottom isn't already. If Dumbledore wasn't keeping everyone stagnant then maybe we could have found a way to bring Alice and Frank out of whatever was done to them. I know the most wizards have done was pour potions down their throat and cast spells that didn't do a thing."

"That's playing with fire," said Sirius.

"Dumbledore has kept us in the dark ages for years with his insistence on keeping the status quot and he's driven out most of the first-gens because he doesn't want to upset his pure blood supporters. When was the last time anyone has heard of any new medical achievements in the UK?"

Sirius winced. When he put it like that, it did sound pretty bad...for Dumbledore.

"Alright, I'll do what I can but don't expect much. Most people still remember that I was in Azkaban illegally for years and might not believe me."

"Well for every ten people that don't believe you, there will be one that does. And one is better than none."

Considering he had to get support from mutants who wouldn't hesitate to kill humans just because they didn't have the gene, and some who were no better than Stryker, Erik was tired of being on the 'bad' side of the equation.

If he was going to bring some equality to the magicals, no matter the bloodline, then dammit he was going to make sure this time he was on the side people _wanted_ to join.

And maybe once he had that under control he'd consider trying to bridge the gaps between magicals and mundanes. If only to merge technology and magic properly.

* * *

Bill Weasley was surprised when he got the letter from Snape asking if he would like to teach history from someone who had first hand knowledge of curse breaking. The fact that the children would technically be learning a few odd spells that the more experienced curse breakers knew was a bonus.

He only agreed for two reasons. One, his parents were openly concerned about a 'reformed' Death Eater as the headmaster while Dumbledore was being investigated. And two, because there had been a notation from Snape stating flatly that if he came they would share the charm that would make it impossible to hear his mother's voice when she reached a certain volume level.

As a victim of his mother's Howlers the scant few times he had done something to reach her notice, Bill had been quick to agree. Besides, he was also worried about Snape running the place.

* * *

Steve Rogers, an American wizard who had an unusual way of looking at things, had been surprised when he got the request to bring standards back up at Hogwarts...or at the very least help break the infamous curse on the class meant to teach students how to deal with the more unpleasant aspects of magical life.

Plagued for years because of memories he had acquired during a particularly nasty mission for the American army, he had no idea how big a shock he was going to get by agreeing to teach some students.

It didn't help in the least that he was considered a "die hard fan" of the _Captain America_ comics, so much so that he had the shield recreated exactly. He took it with him on every mission, whether it was shrunk around his neck or in fully view on his left arm.

So when he did get to Hogwarts, he was confronted with a rather shocking sight of a thirteen-year-old giving the 'headmaster' advice and ideas, along with another who was familiar enough because everyone knew who he was at the tender age of fifteen months.

"Mr. Rogers, I'm glad you accepted our request."

"I wasn't aware that students would be present as well. I thought it was the summer months?"

"It is, but you'll find that the real power of the school is currently in his hands, not mine. I'm just here to make sure Dumbledore can't place one of his lackeys here to keep his spot warm," said Snape.

The Slytherin boy took one look at him, and sighed.

"Captain America. Well at least now we know it's not just the mutants who got sent here," said the boy.

"Do I know you?" he asked. Though he was now wondering if this had anything to do with those other memories.

The boy lifted his left hand, revealing several Chinese meditation balls that rotated without any wand.

To his shock...and a certain amount of recognition...the middle one flattened and changed shape while the other three kept rotating without pause. The comment about mutants was the biggest clue he had though.

"Magneto."

"Mystique, Sabertooth, Rogue, and Nightcrawler are aware as well, though I must admit I'm surprised that you landed here as well."

"What's your real game plan?"

"My plan is to end the nonsense Voldemort started and to keep Dumbledore on the sidelines in a purely research role, seeing as how he refuses to allow proper change to occur. Right now my end game is to bring real equality and not this fake one they have in place now. I'll deal with the mundanes if and when it become necessary," said Magneto.

Snape clearly had no clue what they were talking about, nor did he particularly _care_. Harry had an idea, but he also could care less so long as no one innocent was hurt.

"So what do you want from me?"

"I didn't even know you were here until you showed up, but now that you mention it we could use some help keeping Dumbledore from giving us trouble. And insure Voldemort's stupidity ends here."

Rogers thought about that. Out of all the mutants the only 'evil' one that would absolutely _not_ agree with Voldemort had to be Magneto, and that was because Charles had to explain to the Avengers one year that the metal-controlling mutant was a victim of Hitler's camps.

Magneto might actually be honest about his goal of creating some form of real unity for the magicals, so long as the mundanes didn't try to persecute them like they did with the Witch Trials again.

"I'm not going to go on missions for you," he stated flatly.

"Fine by me, you're going to be more useful teaching anyway. At least if that idiot Dark Lord stays gone," said Magneto equally flat.


	15. Chapter 15

**No, the laptop has not been fixed. Yes, I have found a TEMPORARY replacement that requires an external keyboard, but still has wifi. I am not happy my laptop broke, and the current one is seriously outdated.**

* * *

Sirius made good on his promise of a Firebolt, because a full week before it was commercially available, he presented one to Harry as an early birthday/sorry-I-missed-so-many-chances-to-spoil-you present.

For Erik, he simply got the rarest, hardest metal he could find. Adamantium, which was so hard to get that a single pound was all he could afford, and even he thought that was pushing it considering how expensive it was.

He bought it off some bloke with wicked sideburns and claws made of the stuff. Some man named James Howlett...which he only remembered because he shared the same first name as his best friend.

Naturally when Erik inquired about the man he bought it from, and heard _exactly_ what the man looked like along with pensieve memory, he promptly introduced his head to the nearest hard object.

Vincent was going to be pissed, Rogue would be thrilled, and he would have to keep both sides from trying to gut the other because they could. Of course the fact this "James Howlett" who was clearly Wolverine, was now technically older than Sabertooth was sure to amuse the man endlessly.

The fact he was likely to recognize Magneto by scent alone, never mind Mystique, was not.

The irony being that Wolverine was quite likely the _only_ person alive capable of answering a question that had been bothering him for months, if only because out of all the mutants he knew the man was the only one who survive almost _anything_ thrown at him. His healing factor was that insane.

Fortunately this "James" wasn't likely to move, considering he had a cushy job selling off the adamantium he had.

* * *

Five seconds into meeting James Howlett, he knew the man recognized him...if only by scent...and the fact that Erik currently had him firmly pinned to where he was standing thanks to his control over metal.

"Magneto," he snarled.

"Hello Wolverine. Sabertooth is going to be annoyed beyond belief you're here as well, though I assume Rogue will be thrilled."

"How are you alive? I saw that bullet hit you in the brain stem and the autopsy files," he snarled.

Well that answered one question.

"I didn't. I woke up on the Hogwarts Express with no idea how I got there or where I was nearly two years ago. Though that does answer one question I had...like why I deaged by several decades."

He released his hold over Logan, who reluctantly calmed down since it was pretty obvious he was only there for answers.

Logan sat down on one of the stumps he kept around his property to chop wood on, living in the outer fringes of the magical communities.

"What happened?"

"What did you think happened? Those damn idiots who think mutants are monsters killed everyone in an attempt to 'purify' the human race, but not before putting any mutants or mutant-sympathizers into camps. I survived, but it was years before the population finally stabilized again. Spent years on the fringes until these...magicals...started cropping up. And now you're here," said Logan, tiredly.

Charles always thought Logan might live forever, but they had never confirmed it. Living through the destruction of Earth, the abandonment of the 'civilized' planets who didn't want anything to do with Earth politics and the eventual return of humanity had only cemented the theory he might very well be immortal. It was not something he particularly enjoyed, and neither was the fact that the idiot known as Voldemort tried to recruit him repeatedly when he found out Logan healed from practically anything.

Logan _might_ have joined Dumbledore...if he hadn't smelled the hypocrisy on him the few times he joined in on their "missions" where the SOP was to incapacitate and not kill the Death Eaters. And the amount of bitching when he _did_ gut one simply wasn't worth staying with his little tea club.

So he stayed out of it and kept to himself.

The only problem was that boredom had quite firmly set in at this point.

Erik eyes Wolverine. Years of fighting him meant he had a decent idea of how his mind worked, and how to use him. Wolverine was a Berserker. He didn't mind killing but he hated targeting innocents.

His tactical mind had already worked out what to do with him...and coincidentally keep him _far_ from Sabertooth at the same time.

"Would you object to working with Rogue and Nightcrawler again?"

Wolverine stabbed his large knife into the wood.

"I'm bored and you're not nearly as full of shit as the other idiots. I'll work with you for now, but only as long as you don't start targeting humans again."

"I'll go after them if and _when_ they start persecuting us again like they did before. We are are going to put them down hard and fast this time, though it's nice to finally know where we actually are and what happened."

Logan snorted.

"I'll owl you when I find something you might be interested in doing...and I'll have Mystique forward your new address to the two we've found."

"And Sabertooth?"

"He's Fenrir Greyback's son. I'm going to use him to keep the werewolf contingent in line," deadpanned Erik. "You, on the other hand, might be used more to keep the Death Eaters from becoming a nuisance as head of a wet works group we'll keep to the fringes...and you get to pick who's on it."

"Deal."

"Coincidentally I am currently in the process of locating the one called 'Stan Lee' for thinking it was acceptable to print our lives for mass entertainment," said Erik.

"Him? I told him some of it and let him put his own spin on things," said Logan.

Erik's eyebrow twitched.

"You told him?"

"Most of my disposable income comes from the sales of the 'Wolverine' comics and action figures. They still can't believe how detailed my 'costume' is," smirked Logan.

He mostly contributed it to boredom and the knowledge that comic book nerds would buy practically _anything_ and spend ridiculous amounts of cash to get useless junk to clutter their homes with.

* * *

As predicted, Vincent was _very_ displeased upon learning that Wolverine was in fact not only still alive, but still in the same state as they had left him.

Thought Raven was happy...sort of...to finally find out exactly what the hell happened and a decent reason for why they now had two sets of memories. Reincarnation was a bitch and a half, and that was when you expecting it. Knowing that they had all died, been reborn (or somehow transported in the case of Magneto) to their Earth after a cataclysmic and forced rebirth was not exactly a pleasant thought.

Especially since _now_ they would have to re-contact all the inhabited worlds AGAIN just to get anything done.

Fortunately Magneto had seen (and had Mystique steal) a few blueprints for a portable version of the Bifrost gates, and odds were the Asgardians would at least remember Rogue and Wolverine. Though the Skrulls would be a pain in the ass unless someone had finally killed _them_ off, and that wasn't even bringing into account the Chitauri...

At least they had plenty of time, once Magneto managed to get some semblance of real order and advancement in the magical communities. He idly wondered if Loki had bothered to get over his stupid 'Daddy' complex yet.

Knowing the idiot, probably not, but Erik could care less if he handed over the 'kingship' of Earth provided he got an ironclad vow from the vindictive bastard to at least only go after Thor and leave the damn humans alone.

Magneto wasn't a nice person, but he was above all pragmatic. And Loki was a headache he didn't need and would gladly turn on the people the demi-god actually had a grudge against so long as he wasn't dragged into it. He did not care about the spat between Loki, the adopted child and Thor, the rightful heir.

So if he kept Loki from harassing humans, he could care less what the 'Prince' did in his spare time.

The irony of this whole situation was that for once he was one of the 'good' guys and he was more effective than the one who had lead the "Light" side to boot.

Likely because Magneto understood one very important fact.

It was never the "Light" or "Dark" oriented people who were the most dangerous or useful. When in doubt, enlist as many neutral oriented families as you possibly could, because odds were there were more of them and they had a better hold on common sense. Case in point, the Longbottom, Bones, Abbot and Greengrass clans.

And considering he _was_ technically a neutral, but was perceived as 'dark' because he didn't hesitate or have the same morals as the 'light', that meant he knew _exactly_ how to get these people on his side.

Besides, he knew something neither Dumbledore or Voldemort had thought of. Money was power. He was already well on his way to making a substantial capital and gaining at least 'donations' from the neutrals.

With it he could buy Ministries in bulk and slowly force them to add muggle methods and new ideas. Not to mention giving first-gens a chance.

And through money he could slowly integrate the two sides and keep those that would oppose him or raise another generation of 'blood fanatics' like Stryker in their rightful place.

Either behind bars or in the ground. He could buy out any supporters of their cause, and force them to resort to less-than-legal means of getting money. And then he would get them arrested and keep them in someplace where they either learned the error of their ways or they died. Either way they weren't his problem after that.

Though if he found more idiots like Stryker he would throw his ass into Azkaban and then melt the key down.

He would force magicals and mundanes to work together through the one thing that both sides acknowledge as motivation.

Money.

Right now he needed allies, connections, and people who would at least _listen_ to his requests seriously.

Now that they had some answers as to how they ended up here and what happened, things didn't really change outside of Erik reorganizing his chart of 'allies' and who would lead what part.

Neville was firmly his leader of the pure bloods. The boy was a bit skittish, but like Harry his confidence had been taking some major boosts thanks to his help. The fact Erik trusted him with the blunt truth didn't hurt either.

Vincent was his go-to for werewolves. The older, more cynical wolves acknowledged him because he was the son of a known Alpha. The younger generation acknowledged him because he wasn't following Dumbledore or Voldemort and he could put any upstart in their place.

Mystique was his spymaster. Her shape-shifting ability and natural acting skills made her more effective than Snape, and he was absolutely sure of her loyalty. Something Dumbledore wasn't.

Steve would be their trainer and the one who lead the 'nice' missions like rescues, something Erik knew he would likely agree to, within reason.

Logan was the head of their wetworks team, and would take the less pleasant missions. Unlike Charles or Steve, Erik acknowledge that some people were too troublesome or dangerous to keep alive. If he had his way he would have killed quite a few people before they became a major threat.

Harry? Harry was his right hand man (Mystique firmly had his left) and would act as the 'face' of his organization. Though he would have Mystique take his spot in any speeches or public appearances since he was fully aware Harry hated that.

The twins would be his research division. They were devious enough for it.

As for Rogue and Nightcrawler, he would find some use for them, but it was likely they would simply help Steve or Harry.

* * *

Erik finished the last of the summer homework. If he did things right Dumbledore would be iced out of Hogwarts and the Ministry. Though at this point he would keep things focused on Hogwarts. Then he helped Harry finish his.

It would be interesting to see how the soldier out of time handled dealing with a younger Magneto and his accomplices. Erik fully planned on dumping Harry into his lap with the instructions that Steve teach the boy how to fight and fight dirty. Harry was still learning how to use a knife but he had gotten to the point that Erik said he could carry a real one now.

In the spirit of someone who had been the victim for the majority of their life, Harry kept it on him at all times, even in the bathroom. He would rather explain the awkwardness of having a blade on him than be caught without a weapon when he was ambushed.

Erik hoped for a nice, quiet year where nothing strange happened. Last year it was Lockhart and that damn basilisk, though the look on Sirius' face when he heard about the plumbing pranks were funny. The year before it was the philosopher's stone.

He had debated on whether to give it back or use it, but settled on a more pragmatic approach.

He located Flamel and offered him a deal. He could have the one he gave Dumbledore back in exchange for a lesser one that just created gold, as Erik had no desire to live forever. Besides the Elixir require dragon hearts and unicorn blood, and that was too expensive for his tastes.

There was always catch to using something like that, but a stone that made gold was far more useful in the long run and likely wouldn't have as many dire side effects.

Nicholas had been surprised when he showed up with the agreement to switch stones, but understood his reasoning when he heard Erik's long term goals.

Besides, he was fascinated by 'mutation' such as his ability to control metal and Rogue's ability to quite literally drain magic and any other energy she could get her hands on and then use it against people.

Erik knew for a fact the second she was accredited as a fully-trained French witch, she and Nightcrawler promptly left France and moved in with Logan...who despite his grumblings was glad to have familiar faces around. Rogue had always looked to Wolverine as either an older brother or father figure, but he could never tell which. The fact he could survive her touch was probably a big factor...as was the fact that he never held her powers against her.

He would hold one good thing about this whole reincarnation mess...at least now Rogue had _some_ control over her draining ability even if it did occasionally slip from her.

"So what's on the agenda for this week?"

They had a full month before they were to return to Hogwarts, and outside of stalling the old goat and corroborating the different parties so that everything ran smoothly, they honestly had little to do.

Well...there was the small annoyance that Draco had apparently decided to latch onto Erik in an attempt to get even a smidgen of power once he took full control.

He set the boy onto gathering black mail and commandeered the two thugs that followed Draco _everywhere_ almost. He had plans for them and they involved seeing if those two really were as dense as they appeared publicly.

If they were, he'd use them as the face of his guard dogs, which would keep them out of the way, but at the same time make them feel useful. If they were actually _intelligent_ , or had a brain between them, then he would find what they WERE good at and exploit it ruthlessly.

"We're going to meet a representative of the dwarves, and through them the chance to meet actual elves and not the brownies who call themselves 'house elves'. Though that could take _months_ to arrange."

"How are you going to make them more willing to listen?"

"Two things. One, I'm going to find a location with an untapped mine of metal. And two, I'm bringing the best mead and other liquor I can find to grease the wheels."

Thank you Sirius for not asking too many questions like why he needed that much real alcohol.


	16. Chapter 16

It was shortly after meeting the dwarves (and getting their agreement to at least talk to the other clans in hopes of overthrowing the goblin's hold on the gold supply) that Erik realized their year might not be as...simple...as he had hoped.

This was because he had belatedly realized what he believed to be a simple psychic ability was anything _but_ psychic.

Harry had gone from being able to read minds to being able to crudely manipulate metal in the same way _he_ did. It wasn't the same refined shifting that Erik could do, but the fact he was able to slowly force the metal scraps the dwarves had lying around into different shapes woke Erik up to one important fact.

Either Harry was able to use his magic to inexpertly imitate the mutations he saw...or he had a mutation himself to copy any he came across.

It would explain how he was able to get his hair to remotely stay down that morning. He copied Mystique. Well that and he had the same bloodline she did meant he was possibly a metamorph like Tonks.

Only one way to find out for sure...and the technology was at a decent enough point that he could reasonably see if Harry did in fact have what Charles once dubbed the 'X' gene which triggered mutation.

Or he could ask Logan if he had seen any other mutants.

* * *

Logan had seen other mutants, but because they were picked up by the magicals and mistaken for them, generally the gene got degraded and turned off by too much inbreeding.

So the fact Harry might have it wasn't that surprising. Especially considering the ones who had even a portion of Mystique's gift of transformation married into the Black clan back when they were still druids...and got buried under so much inter-breeding.

Erik took a sample of Harry's blood, and with the help of Raven managed to get into a lab where he could examine it. It was crude by his standards, but it worked for what he needed it for.

"Well?"

"He has it. I'm guessing he picked up the mind reading from Snape when he helped us build our mental barriers. The metal manipulation he got from me, and the shape-shifting from you and Nymph. The question is what exactly is his mutation, or is his magic compensating for what he sees?" said Erik.

"Easy way to find out," said Raven, stepping away from the table she had been leaning on.

"How?"

"Introduce him to Rogue or Nightcrawler. Or we could let him meet Wolverine and see if he picks up the accelerated healing...or his claws."

"Healing is more likely, but we might as well visit him anyway. And I know you'd enjoy spending more time with Rogue and Nightcrawler."

Raven perked up. Now that they were roughly the same 'age', she had more to talk with Rogue about. Besides, it would be hilarious if she could get Harry interested in her adopted daughter from another life, and Rogue could use someone like Harry in hers.

* * *

So a few weeks before the school year restarted (Dumbledore still hadn't gotten his post back, and if they had any say about it he never would) Erik took Harry with him so he could meet the infamous Wolverine. It was safer than letting him meet Sabertooth, partly because of the fact he was in the wilderness, but mostly because he didn't need Harry accidentally mimicking a werewolf.

Harry _barely_ refrained from having a fan boy moment, because Wolverine was one of his favorite characters after getting hooked on the _X-Men_ series. He blamed the fact that he had originally believed Erik was a Magneto fan for that.

He liked Wolverine because the world just kept piling the shit onto him and he still came out on top and ready to kick some ass. Besides, what little boy wouldn't love a character that smoke, drank, swore and had metal claws that couldn't be killed?

Logan took Harry's fan boy side in stride, and even signed one of his comics for him. It was nice to be appreciated.

Erik just found it cute.

But what Raven, Erik, and even Logan all found adorable was the way Harry reacted to Rogue. It was pretty clear the boy had a thing for the 'older' girls, but never looked at Raven or Nymph that way because they were family.

And among the mutants, Harry's own power became pretty clear within a span of a single week.

He had the ability to mimic or copy mutation almost perfectly. If someone had two mutations, like Logan did (because there was no other way to classify his accelerated healing as anything _but_ mutation) then his powers would copy the most feasible one for him to use.

In this case, Logan's healing ability, Kurt's teleportation (which had tickled him blue when he saw Harry copying it), and of course a greater degree of control over metal from Erik.

It was Rogue's mutation that made his more obvious.

He couldn't drain mutant powers (or memories) like she could...but the rate he was able to mimic and control them shot up after he met her.

The fact he had a crush on her was still pretty adorable for the 'adults' to watch though.

It took Erik all of two days to come up with the perfect mutant codename for him. Mystic. Partially because he was also a wizard, but mostly because he was related to Raven who's codename had always been Mystique.

On the plus side, at least Erik knew what they would be doing this year...training Harry in how to properly use his mutation and hopefully be able to pick which powers he learned to mimic or copy.

* * *

Snape was beyond thrilled at how this year was starting. Not only was he in charge for once, but with any luck he wouldn't be stuck teaching the snot nosed brats for the entire year!

Sure, giving Hagrid the post of the COMC teacher was a small issue, but as long as he kept the half-giant paired with an 'assistant' he wouldn't have to worry about it.

He was sure Bill Weasley could at least keep Hagrid from going overboard, at least until he knew the man could bring creatures that wouldn't horrifically maim the students. Besides, as the history teacher it wasn't likely that the oldest Weasley child would have as much homework to grade and kept him out of Snape's way.

Announcing the new teachers, he felt a profound sense of satisfaction. Mostly because he wouldn't have to deal directly with the students and he knew Erik would be able to keep the worst of the Slytherins in line for him, since he couldn't be Head of House while he was acting Headmaster.

He knew Lucius was currently planning to start rumors about how Snape had 'improved' the conditions at the school and that maybe it was time for Dumbledore to 'retire' so he could focus on one job instead of three at once. Considering he was well over a hundred years old, that was something Dumbledore couldn't really contest because he had been run ragged thanks to Fudge and his ridiculous requests.

Snape barely hid a smirk as he sat down to eat.

A Gryffindor would deal with Dumbledore by trying to take control directly, thus setting himself up for a personal fall. A Slytherin created multiple puppets that could do all the paperwork for them and allowed them to rule from the shadows.

Snape knew he fell under the category of 'Puppet' and frankly didn't care. Working for Lehnscherr was infinitely preferable to the life he had been living under Dumbledore's thumb or the Dark Lord's wand.

The question was who Lehnscherr would put into place as Minister, since he clearly didn't like Cornelius Fudge. The man was too much of a coward and Erik didn't have the patience to hold the man's hand through every 'crisis'. Besides, according to Lucius he was far too easily bribed and he whined when the supply was cut off.

Malfoy already had to warn the Minister that he might be overdue to being 'replaced' because the man had gone sniffing about the other Dark families in hopes of getting scraps since Black's trial was leaving him in the poor house. Considering how much Lucius had gotten done by keeping the man paid and happy, the other families might take him up even if it meant they were paying off the debt the Minister owed Black.

So Snape observed the now third year Slytherin to see what he would do about the issue.

And he wasn't disappointed.

About a month into the school year (with Weasley narrowly avoiding an inquiry from the Ministry because Draco had done something positively Gryffindor-level stupid around a Hippogryff he had deliberately insulted) Erik approached Susan Bones in an effort to gain connections to her aunt.

Amelia Bones was tough, but fair...and she had no tolerance for Death Eaters or Dumbledore's shit.

She was a strictly 'neutral' ally and the current head of the DMLE.

He kept his ear to the ground to see how things would progress... and by the time the first Hogsmeade visit rolled around, Fudge had been thrown out of office and replaced in a landslide vote for Amelia Bones in less than a week.

She was acceptable for the pure bloods, she was well liked by the "Light" side, and the "Dark" side generally followed Lucius who had agreed to support her.

Considering he was still angry over learning he had been following a bastard half blood (literally in this case) of a squib and a muggle, he wasn't exactly inclined to follow Voldemort twice.

And while he didn't exactly _like_ the muggleborns, he could accept Erik's desire to keep any magical blood they could, if only for breeding purposes.

Marrying your cousin was fine and all, but overdoing it lead to health problems and eventually squibs that didn't have half a brain between them.

It was hard to dispute the evidence when the number of births among the pure bloods had dropped like a stone in recent years, while the number of half-bloods had shot up.

* * *

"So what exactly is the big appeal to this place?" asked Harry. He never really got why the students always seemed so excited about going to Hogsmeade. The excitement over visiting the magical village had dropped pretty quick during the whole plumbing fiasco last year...even if he knew why it had to be done.

"Students get antsy if they can't get out of the castle and away from the teacher's watch. So letting them enjoy the village is an easy way to keep them under control. Though for those born in big cities there's very little appeal except trying to get past the bartender in getting actual liquor. Well that and the shop where people get sweets, pranks and books anyway. I think it's mostly because they can leave the castle for a few hours and not feel pressured to be good little students."

Harry paused, considered that, before an evil smirk appeared on his face.

"I know that look. You've thought of something devious and positively evil...for the teachers anyway."

"Well the house cup is all about behaving and doing what the teachers tell you too, right? Basically being good little witches and wizards, even though we never see the damn thing even in our Head of House's office."

"Yes..." said Erik, not sure what he was getting at.

"So what if, and this is only speculation at this point, Dumbledore comes back and someone just _happened_ to point out that the teachers were tricking the students into behaving all so their house colors could be seen at the end of the year and a trophy that no one has actually seen or gets any use out of it?" said Harry, his evil smirk firmly in place.

Erik opened his mouth to reply, then closed it after thinking the better of it. He had to admit, when Harry put it like that it sounded like an excellent way to start up some good old-fashioned anarchy and maybe give people a reason to throw Dumbledore right back out.

Charles had a much more efficient system in place to keep the students in line.

He threatened them with an extended training session with Logan if they didn't behave or back talked too much, and considering Logan wasn't exactly the kind of person who went easy on smartass kids, it was an effective way of shutting them up.

By the time he got to them, they were generally teenagers and forcing them to work with Sabertooth for a month or giving them something to direct their anger at generally helped.

He only ever stepped in for the younger children during the really bad cases or when Charles couldn't because of political reasons.

Ironically during the latter it was usually _Charles_ who told him where they were and what sort of power they had... and once the heat died down Erik had a habit of simply making a discreet hand off to the Institute, as he had limited experience with children, baring the few that got attached and refused to go.

Since he tried not to get too close during the cool down faze, that rarely happened. But it did occasionally when he took an open interest in them, hence why he knew how to deal with Harry and Neville.

It was why despite being on opposite sides they still got along. To quote one of the books Harry had read after meeting Charlie... Erik did not make war on children.*

Erik looked at Harry with a smirk.

"If Dumbledore somehow manages to get back into the school, then not only should you comment loudly on that, but I'll have the others mention it as well to the other houses," said Erik. Harry smiled innocently at him, which didn't fool Erik for a minute. Children were the most devious creatures in existence.

* * *

 _ ***A/N**_ **:** ** _I'm paraphrasing a line in a book written by Mercedes Lackey called_ "Joust" _where Ari passionately claims after hearing about a pretty nasty attack on a small village "I do not make war on children!" to his dragon boy called Vetch. I would absolutely recommend the series._**


End file.
